Starting Pitcher Fantasy Baseball Breakouts or Fake Outs? Pitchers On The Rise (Week 9)

May 28, 2026

Are these pitchers fantasy baseball breakouts or fake outs? Dan analyzes advanced pitcher statistics and surging fantasy baseball SPs for Week 9 of 2026, including Spencer Arrighetti, Ben Brown, and others.

If you like big curveballs, you're going to love this edition of breakouts or fakeouts, as two of our three pitchers featured this week have some of the best benders in the game. I'm talking about Spencer Arrighetti and Ben Brown, of course. And our third pitcher is a guy who has come out of nowhere to log some very impactful innings for the Angels and fantasy managers, Walbert Urena.

If you are new to this column, remember that the goal is to look at several pitchers each week who are showing signs of "breaking out." That term gets thrown around a lot in our industry, but to me, it means they're flirting with the possibility of improving their baseline performance across a larger sample.

So, while we typically look at younger pitchers as potential "breakouts," I won't limit myself to only youngsters. The concept of the breakout can be applied to pitchers of all experience levels, as we have seen numerous examples of pitchers improving significantly from season to season, even into their 30s. All rostership percentages are courtesy of Yahoo! Let's see which of these arms we can trust going forward and where to expect regression!

Spencer Arrighetti, Houston Astros

• 69% Rostered
• 2025 stats: 35.1 IP, 5.35 ERA, 1.42 WHIP, 19.9% K%, 12.8% BB%
• 2026 stats: 41 IP, 1.32 ERA, 1.20 WHIP, 22.9% K%, 14.3% BB%

Did anyone have Arrighetti being the most consistent starting pitcher on the Houston staff this season on their bingo card? I know I didn't, but the young righty has been incredibly solid for Houston in 2026.

He missed the first three weeks of the season, but has made seven starts and has yet to allow more than two earned runs in a game this year. In fact, he's allowed two earned runs just once, giving up one run or zero runs in the other six starts.

Arrighetti's big curveball is a thing of beauty and has been very effective this year. He has above-average vertical and horizontal break on the pitch, and it's limited hitters to a .082 average with a 48% Whiff%

Spencer Arrighetti, Nasty 76mph Curveball. 🍝 pic.twitter.com/nJVwPTLc4W

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) May 2, 2026

He's really leaning on his curveball hard this year, as it's his most commonly thrown pitch at 32% usage. He's almost ditched his cutter entirely, but continues to throw his four-seamer, sinker, changeup, and sweeper about the same amount of the time as he did last year.

While I am always in favor of a pitcher throwing their best pitch more often, it is interesting to see him leading with the curveball even more often than the four-seamer.

I do worry about pitchers who are so reliant on a specific offspeed pitch, and the fact that his other pitches are getting hit hard only adds to that concern.

His four-seamer, sinker, changeup, and cutter all have xSLG% over .500, which helps explain the gap between his xERA (4.79) and ERA (1.32).

But the bad news doesn't stop there. Arrighetti's SIERA is 4.74, likely because he's only been an average strikeout pitcher, while walking way too many hitters (14.3%) and not getting all that many ground balls (35% GB%).

Do you want more red flags? He has an unsustainable 87.7% strand rate, .223 BABIP, and 2.3% HR/FB. Those are all ripe for regression.

Now, I'm not here to say that Arrighetti won't still produce some usable fantasy stats this season, but it's pretty clear that he's outperforming his underlying metrics in just about every way possible. I won't be surprised in the slightest if he struggles against the Rangers today.

Verdict: Sell high! Or at least temper your expectations for Arrighetti going forward, because he's a certified fake-out!

Ben Brown, Chicago Cubs

• 42% Rostered
• 2025 stats: 106.1 IP, 5.92 ERA, 1.44 WHIP, 25.6 % K%, 6.8% BB%
• 2026 stats: 44.2 IP, 2.01 ERA, 0.99 WHIP, 26.4% K%, 7.9% BB%

Brown is in his third major league season, having cut his teeth with 55 innings back in 2024 and then starting 15 games for the Cubs last year. He started in the bullpen this year, but has moved into the rotation recently and has now made four starts.

Ben Brown since entering the Cubs rotation:

19 IP
1.89 ERA
23 K : 6 BB

The introduction of his sinker has made him one of the more effective pitchers in baseball this season.

His curveball is posting a 3.3 RV/100🔥pic.twitter.com/vkWcxsJsjx

— Andrew DeCeglie (@Andrew_FBB) May 25, 2026

I teased it in the introduction, but Brown also has one of the better curveballs in the game. Unlike Arrighetti's slow curve, Brown throws his knuckle curve around 87 mph, and it has a much tighter shape. It ranks third in Stuff+ rating behind only Aaron Nola and Joe Ryan - some pretty good company.

His curveball is eliciting a 49% Whiff% and just a .132 opposing batting average.

The curveball has always been his best pitch, but the fact that he can pair it with a live 96 mph four-seamer that has average vertical movement and above-average arm-side run gives him some pretty solid strikeout potential. We've seen the strikeouts be one area where he's been pretty consistent.

But he was basically a two-pitch guy for his first two seasons, barely using his changeup and leaning hard on his fastball, which was getting hit hard.

This year, he's added a sinker to his arsenal, allowing him to drop that four-seam usage by around 20%. The sinker has made a big impact on his batted ball results, as he's sporting a career-best 53.5% GB%. The sinker also has been successful at keeping hitters from sitting on his fastball, a pitch that he allowed 11 home runs on last season and has given up just one long ball this year.

Unlike Arrighetti, Brown's underlying stats (3.00 SIERA, 2.86 xERA) back up his elite ratios, and his strikeouts seem very sustainable (12.3%) as well.

If Brown has really fixed his home run problem, then he's a pitcher who really interests me in fantasy baseball this year. It's only been a few starts, but he looks like a young pitcher who has finally found a pitch mix and approach that will enable him to be effective going forward.

Verdict: Buy Ben Brown! He has far more upside and potential than Arrighetti, both in ratios and strikeouts. He shouldn't be floating around on waiver wires with this profile; he looks absolutely legit to me.

Walbert Urena, Los Angeles Angels

• 15% Rostered
• 2025 Double-A stats: 141 IP, 4.39 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, 19.8% K%, 12.1% BB%
• 2026 stats: 38.1 IP, 2.58 ERA, 1.38 WHIP, 21.4% K%, 13.1% BB%

When I say that Walbert Urena came out of nowhere, I mean it. He pitched mainly at Double-A last season, making just one start at Triple-A in 2025. He made a few relief appearances in March before being sent back down to the minors to get stretched out.

Urena has now made seven starts for the Angels in 2026, allowing more than two earned runs just once! He's a hard-thrower, sitting 97-98 mph on his four-seamer and sinker with the ability to touch 100 mph. His changeup is one of the fastest changeups in the league, too, averaging 91 mph.

Walbert Ureña, Nasty 92mph Changeup. 👌 pic.twitter.com/PQcxWdnEym

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) May 6, 2026

His profile reminds me a bit of fellow Angels' righty Jose Soriano in that he features a hard sinker that leads to a lot of ground balls (50% GB%) but can also struggle with control (13.1% BB). The high changeup usage (30%) and velocity on his changeup remind me a bit of Edward Cabrera, too, who also struggled with control issues before finally breaking out last year.

He has a sweeper, too, that he primarily uses against righties, while he's much more reliant on his best pitch (the changeup) against lefties. The changeup has been very good with a 35.7% Whiff% and a .140 xBA.

There's some potential for more strikeouts here as Walbert's SwStr% is sitting at 11.6%, but the walks definitely concern me. Eventually, all those free passes will catch up with him, even if the batted ball results (xERA of 3.31) have been very good.

Verdict: There's a lot to like here, even if we don't have much of a sample to go off with this young pitcher. He has some very good stuff and could continue to improve with more experience. I think he's one of the more compelling options on the wire in most leagues, and I'd consider picking him up to see how he progresses this year.

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