Justin Mason’s Top 126 SP for 2020
Hello Draft Season!
Here are my top 126 starting pitchers for 2020, which is one more that Paul Sporer’s list from yesterday (shrug emoji)(sunglasses emoji). Paul and I will be talking about the differences there are between his and my list on today’s Sleeper and the Bust, so definitely check that out. For more ranks of mine for 2020, you can click the links below:
Justin Mason’s Top 126 SP for 2020
| Rank | Player | Team | ADP |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jacob deGrom | NYM | 8.66 |
| 2 | Gerrit Cole | NYY | 5.77 |
| 3 | Justin Verlander | HOU | 14.05 |
| 4 | Max Scherzer | WAS | 17.4 |
| 5 | Walker Buehler | LAD | 17.23 |
| 6 | Mike Clevinger | CLE | 23.49 |
| 7 | Blake Snell | TB | 36.55 |
| 8 | Chris Sale | BOS | 39.14 |
| 9 | Shane Bieber | CLE | 28.89 |
| 10 | Jack Flaherty | STL | 24.52 |
| 11 | Luis Castillo | CIN | 49.77 |
| 12 | Patrick Corbin | WAS | 47.78 |
| 13 | Stephen Strasburg | WAS | 29.32 |
| 14 | Luis Severino | NYY | 60.4 |
| 15 | Aaron Nola | PHI | 50.66 |
| 16 | Lucas Giolito | CWS | 53.03 |
| 17 | Clayton Kershaw | LAD | 55.82 |
| 18 | Charlie Morton | TB | 60.42 |
| 19 | Tyler Glasnow | TB | 68.72 |
| 20 | Yu Darvish | CHC | 69.49 |
| 21 | Chris Paddack | SD | 51.28 |
| 22 | Noah Syndergaard | NYM | 73.92 |
| 23 | Trevor Bauer | CIN | 82.68 |
| 24 | Zack Greinke | HOU | 69.6 |
| 25 | Brandon Woodruff | MIL | 88.37 |
| 26 | José Berríos | MIN | 92.02 |
| 27 | Mike Soroka | ATL | 104.23 |
| 28 | James Paxton | NYY | 92.22 |
| 29 | Lance Lynn | TEX | 133.48 |
| 30 | Carlos Carrasco | CLE | 110.37 |
| 31 | Zac Gallen | ARZ | 127 |
| 32 | Frankie Montas | OAK | 122.29 |
| 33 | Sonny Gray | CIN | 101.86 |
| 34 | Hyun-Jin Ryu | TOR | 110.83 |
| 35 | Eduardo Rodriguez | BOS | 131.05 |
| 36 | Jesus Luzardo | OAK | 125.72 |
| 37 | Madison Bumgarner | ARZ | 116.48 |
| 38 | Zack Wheeler | PHI | 121.92 |
| 39 | Mike Minor | TEX | 172.57 |
| 40 | Corey Kluber | TEX | 89.57 |
| 41 | Kyle Hendricks | CHC | 159.63 |
| 42 | Matthew Boyd | DET | 166.43 |
| 43 | Andrew Heaney | LAA | 184.95 |
| 44 | Shohei Ohtani | LAA | 93.11 |
| 45 | Sean Manaea | OAK | 170.52 |
| 46 | Luke Weaver | ARZ | 187.85 |
| 47 | Carlos Martinez | STL | 190.98 |
| 48 | Mike Foltynewicz | ATL | 200.32 |
| 49 | Kenta Maeda | LAD | 200.57 |
| 50 | David Price | BOS | 187.54 |
| 51 | Max Fried | ATL | 145.06 |
| 52 | Robbie Ray | ARZ | 149.54 |
| 53 | German Márquez | COL | 174.89 |
| 54 | Julio Urías | LAD | 162.15 |
| 55 | Dinelson Lamet | SD | 120.12 |
| 56 | Joe Musgrove | PIT | 214.17 |
| 57 | Mitch Keller | PIT | 231.97 |
| 58 | Jon Gray | COL | 247.78 |
| 59 | Kyle Gibson | TEX | 356.92 |
| 60 | Garrett Richards | SD | 282.55 |
| 61 | Dylan Cease | CWS | 294.91 |
| 62 | MacKenzie Gore | SD | 318.95 |
| 63 | Lance McCullers Jr. | HOU | 188.95 |
| 64 | Jeff Samardzija | SF | 322.94 |
| 65 | Ross Stripling | LAD | 312.94 |
| 66 | Sandy Alcantara | MIA | 265.74 |
| 67 | Marcus Stroman | NYM | 218.98 |
| 68 | Domingo German | NYY | 259.82 |
| 69 | Chris Bassitt | OAK | 333.31 |
| 70 | A.J. Puk | OAK | 256.55 |
| 71 | Griffin Canning | LAA | 224.37 |
| 72 | Jake Odorizzi | MIN | 182.75 |
| 73 | Miles Mikolas | STL | 227.06 |
| 74 | Michael Kopech | CWS | 264.89 |
| 75 | Cole Hamels | ATL | 264.29 |
| 76 | Johnny Cueto | SF | 315.62 |
| 77 | Forrest Whitley | HOU | 285.89 |
| 78 | Masahiro Tanaka | NYY | 236.65 |
| 79 | Nathan Eovaldi | BOS | 395.86 |
| 80 | Joey Lucchesi | SD | 221.97 |
| 81 | Anthony DeSclafani | CIN | 270.17 |
| 82 | Chris Archer | PIT | 265.69 |
| 83 | Michael Pineda | MIN | 304.05 |
| 84 | Marco Gonzales | SEA | 355.89 |
| 85 | Tyler Beede | SF | 418.89 |
| 86 | Dallas Keuchel | CWS | 278.38 |
| 87 | Reynaldo López | CWS | 297.42 |
| 88 | Kevin Gausman | SF | 436.08 |
| 89 | Caleb Smith | MIA | 218.69 |
| 90 | Dustin May | LAD | 247.18 |
| 91 | Aaron Civale | CLE | 288.32 |
| 92 | Patrick Sandoval | LAA | 498.29 |
| 93 | Brad Peacock | HOU | 469.38 |
| 94 | Zach Davies | SD | 444.89 |
| 95 | Dakota Hudson | STL | 291.42 |
| 96 | Jose Quintana | CHC | 314.14 |
| 97 | Anibal Sanchez | WAS | 332.37 |
| 98 | Nate Pearson | TOR | 368.48 |
| 99 | Steven Matz | NYM | 290.83 |
| 100 | Sixto Sachez | MIA | 455.08 |
| 101 | Yusei Kikuchi | SEA | 523.26 |
| 102 | Justin Dunn | SEA | 570.57 |
| 103 | Deivi Garcia | NYY | 592.6 |
| 104 | Sean Newcomb | ATL | 526.38 |
| 105 | Kyle Wright | ATL | 540.55 |
| 106 | Jose Urquidy | HOU | 231.62 |
| 107 | Yonny Chirinos | TB | 285.31 |
| 108 | Jordan Lyles | TEX | 392.51 |
| 109 | Adrian Houser | MIL | 271.12 |
| 110 | Joshua James | HOU | 406.22 |
| 111 | Zach Eflin | PHI | 408.03 |
| 112 | Wade Miley | CIN | 441.26 |
| 113 | John Means | BAL | 345.22 |
| 114 | Matt Manning | DET | 445.06 |
| 115 | Danny Duffy | KC | 513.72 |
| 116 | Homer Bailey | MIN | 518.55 |
| 117 | Rick Porcello | NYM | 408 |
| 118 | Jon Lester | CHC | 388.42 |
| 119 | Tyler Mahle | CIN | 385.58 |
| 120 | Justus Sheffield | SEA | 396.42 |
| 121 | Mike Fiers | OAK | 377.4 |
| 122 | Julio Teheran | LAA | 350.78 |
| 123 | Pablo Lopez | MIA | 338.12 |
| 124 | Spencer Turnbull | DET | 450.03 |
| 125 | Dylan Bundy | LAA | 321.54 |
| 126 | Ryan Yarbrough | TB | 260.97 |
You Aren't a FanGraphs Member
It looks like you aren't yet a FanGraphs Member (or aren't logged in). We aren't mad, just disappointed.
We get it. You want to read this article. But before we let you get back to it, we'd like to point out a few of the good reasons why you should become a Member.
1. Ad Free viewing! We won't bug you with this ad, or any other.
2. Unlimited articles! Non-Members only get to read 10 free articles a month. Members never get cut off.
3. Dark mode and Classic mode!
4. Custom player page dashboards! Choose the player cards you want, in the order you want them.
5. One-click data exports! Export our projections and leaderboards for your personal projects.
6. Remove the photos on the home page! (Honestly, this doesn't sound so great to us, but some people wanted it, and we like to give our Members what they want.)
7. Even more Steamer projections! We have handedness, percentile, and context neutral projections available for Members only.
8. Get FanGraphs Walk-Off, a customized year end review! Find out exactly how you used FanGraphs this year, and how that compares to other Members. Don't be a victim of FOMO.
9. A weekly mailbag column, exclusively for Members.
10. Help support FanGraphs and our entire staff! Our Members provide us with critical resources to improve the site and deliver new features!
We hope you'll consider a Membership today, for yourself or as a gift! And we realize this has been an awfully long sales pitch, so we've also removed all the other ads in this article. We didn't want to overdo it.
Justin is the co-host on The Sleeper and The Bust Podcast and writes for Rotographs covering the Roto Riteup as well as other periodic articles. In addition to his work at Rotographs, Justin is the lead fantasy writer/analyst and co-owner for FriendswithFantasyBenefits.com, and the owner of The Great Fantasy Baseball Invitational. He is also a certified addiction treatment counselor. Follow Justin on Twitter @JustinMasonFWFB.
Good list. Top 20 seems just about perfect. What’s the reasoning for Manaea, Heaney above Fried? Fried seems like a steal here.
Perhaps b/c there’s risk that Fried will spend time in the bullpen?
I dont see 5 better starts on ATL over Fried. Not sure I see 2.
One can definitely tell the sharp belief differences between you and Paul in the bounce back seasons of Jordan Lyles and Homer Bailey. With the success of Mike Minor in Texas, you don’t think Lyles will be able to replicate his success? I’m with you on Bailey, though… his name gives me the same shudders as Wade Miley’s no matter how good or bad he’s been doing.
Yarb is dead last? You blind?
cant wait to get snell and severino at those ADPs
You are missing Urquidy?
based on ADP he could go as high as Keller or the 53rd best from 106th. Seems he has the largest range.
He is 106
Will be interested to hear about why the Urquidy hate
I like this list way better than Paul’s. I would have put Sale in the 25-35 range, as I see him headed for TJS sooner rather than later. I’d make the opposite argument for Kopech. If he’s truly healthy with no innings limit, he’s top 20 for me. Blake Snell? Who knows. Everyone has that one player they project wrong every year. Mine is Blake Snell, so he’ll probably win another Cy Young in 2020.
Kopech is a virtual guarantee to be on an innings limit. At least that is the prevailing thought around Chicago, 120 to 130 IP might be the upper limit for him with Giolito, Keuchel, Gonzalez, Cease, Lopez and around mid season Rodon vying for starts. However, White Sox pitchers will get a boost with Grandal behind the plate going forward.
Would love to hear more about Nola from you (#15) and Paul (#27). He seems to be one of the higher ranked pitcher that has a big spread of opinions on him and would love to hear what you guys see differently.
Kind of like the differences from his 2018 and 2019 seasons lol.
As a Nola owner I thought 27 was little lower than I’d expected (or I could say hoped lol) and 15 is where I’d like to see him.
To me his biggest issue last year was his walk rate being way higher than at any point of his career. I’m not smart enough to know why that was but am generally a believer in regression to the mean so I expect it come back into line.
I would love to hear what Paul and Justin think about Nola specifically.
I like how you and Paul are both shading Lamet. Hard to imagine that a one-pitch guy will have enduring success as a starter.
Plesac needs some love. Not much. But some.
Plesac has a very promising future. He will be on this list very soon. The Tribe is loaded with pitching. Plesac has a place in this game. Watch where he is next year.
Bauer at 23 seems like a huge risk to me. Sure, he gets you a lot of strikeouts, but his ugly 2019 looks an awful lot like his 2015 through 2017, making his 2018 looks like one hell of an outlier.
That is sort of how I feel about Nola to a lesser extent. I mean he has always been pretty good, but one season where he massively outperformed fip is basically why he is so high in most peoples rankings.
Strasburg *below* Castillo and Corbin?
Post contract falloff?
There is another guy on his team who he looked a lot better than for basically the second half of the season…
Does an SP having a 2-pitch arsenal affect your rankings? I’ve never nailed down how to assess this attribute. In your top 21 are Glasnow (~95% two pitches) and Paddack (~90% 2 pitches, and the 3rd pitch had a negative value in 2019). I’ve seen many in Fangraphs express concerns, for example, about challenge to go through the lineup a 2nd time. If it is a consideration for you, is it possible the format you assume (daily, and/or wins aren’t relevant, and/or …) mitigates the impact?
If you think Whitley and Kopech are the equivalent of Hamels and Tanaka this year, I’d love to play in a league with you.
I’m not convinced on Whitley (yet). Guys with spotty command spook me until they prove otherwise. Fantasy-wise, guys who go five innings and use up 100 pitches getting there do nothing for me. However, I do like Kopech a lot. Aside from a potential <150 innings limit, I'd much rather have him than either Hamels of Tanaka.
PS: Will have one opening in my 15 x 15 league if you're interested. Always looking for serious players.
Kopech will 100% have an innings limit though. How can you possibly peg him for more than 100-120 MLB innings this year when he’s coming off TJ, never thrown more than 140 innings in a season, and probably won’t even start the season in the bigs?
Will Kopech start in AAA? I have to think that is a strong possibility coming off his injury. Why push him when they are an outsider for an October play?
Why so low on Lucchesi?
Interested in the biggg discrepancy between Luis Castillo and Sonny Gray, as they put up essentially the same season last year with similar profiles.
Thanks for the list. I just wonder if you would lay out what criteria you use to determine the list, preferably in chart form for each pitcher, though you likely have done this in the past. thank you.
I want to know why McKay was so low on the first list and not listed at all here. #4 prick, prospect pedigree, did great in minors, great command and control, 95+ FB, ~4 FIP last year. He will be starting because he’s already had service time start. it’s Snell, Glasnow, McKay, Chirinos, Morton. Yarbs is next up once the invevitable injury strikes. If healthy, McKay should get 150IP I would think. How he isn’t on this list and justus Sheffield is I have no idea. I checked it twice and didn’t see him…so if he is listed I stand corrected in advance.
The top 5 pricks were immediately disqualified
I see that you said basically the same thing in another article, minus the prick part. And no, I disagree. Roster resource, which is the best depth chart currently doesn’t even have him in the MLB. I tend to agree, he will likely start in the minors, and Beeks is going to see starts/bulk as well. They also want him to hit, and they certainly do not have at bats available currently at the MLB level unless a trade happens. The only way I see a path to him getting a lot of innings in the mlb this year is if they trade someone, or dfa someone. Martinez will not miss a lefty starter, but McKay wasn’t going to hit vs lefties anyways. They didn’t sign Tsutgo to sit him, and they still have Lowe who is a far better hitter likely on the roster/taxi squad. The only path to him getting playing time in my eyes is an injury, or Choi getting released. I know that seems quite crazy, but they did just get rid of Cron in a similar situation last year, and Choi is somewhat repetitive. McKay is in line for basically what he did last year, lots of getting jerked around.
I’m no expert…but Folty over Fried? No way.
Folty will be just fine.
Giolito over Kershaw, lol. Seriously, when do the real rankings come out?