Starting Pitcher Chart – August 29th, 2024

• Daily SP Chart archive
• Check out the August SP Rankings (NEW!)

Ewww, ugly board after the lock starters. And even some of the locks have wicked matchups (Hunter Brown, Sonny Gray, Bowden Francis, Cristopher Sánchez, and Brady Singer all facing top 6 offenses v. their respective handedness). The 2-x guys are either would-be 3-x’s who aren’t super trustworthy right now (Kutter Crawford,  Bobby Miller) or a complete wildcard who has impressed of late but still not sure we know who he is as a pitcher (Keider Montero). Just be careful out there, y’all!

Brayan Bello absolutely smoked the Jays tonight with 8 shutout innings, allowing just 2 hits and a walk with 9 punchies in his best start of the season. That doesn’t necessarily give me more confidence in Crawford, though, as he’s struggling more than Bello was ahead of this start. Crawford’s toting an 8.13 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, and 11% K-BB in his last 7 starts.

Miller was strong last time out (6 IP/3 ER/0 BB/7 Ks), but that was against Tampa Bay which is way different than facing Baltimore. He did still allow 2 HRs to account for all 3 of those runs. That’s a shakyyy 2-x reco. Just saying I could see it in 12s and 15s, but it’s more of an upside shoot-the-moon play. Hayden Birdsong and Cade Povich are even deeper Hail Mary shots.

I know Francis draws the difficult Red Sox, but he is absolutely dialed in right now and I just can’t see passing on the start: 1.91 ERA, 0.61 WHIP, 26% K-BB in 33 IP since returning on July 29th. In that span, his ranks in those categories are 5th, 1st, and 7th in baseball (min. 25 IP).

Speaking of dialed in, Ryne Nelson’s been on fire even longer with a 2.76 ERA, 0.95 WHIP, 21% K-BB in 62 IP since July 1st. He ranks 12th, 8th, and 18th in that time, though unfortunately is just 4-0 despite Arizona playing well and going 8-2 during those 10 outings.

By the way, MacKenzie Gore possibly finding his footing again with a 2nd straight gem (6 IP/2 ER/6 Ks, W v. NYY) on a night when Dylan Crews hit his first MLB HR and James Wood steals 3 bases as they go 4-for-8 with 3 RBI, 2 R has to give Nats fans some hope.

—

The chart includes their 2024 stats (this changed over from last year’s stats on April 22nd), their opponent’s wOBA rank versus the pitcher’s handedness from this year so far (this is changed as of April 11th) and over the last 30 days, my general start/sit recommendation for 10-team, 12-team, and 15-team (or more) leagues, and then a note about them. Obviously, there are league sizes beyond those three so it’s essentially a shallow, medium, deep. If a pitcher only has an “x” in 15-team, it doesn’t mean there’s no potential use in 10s and 12s, but that just means it is a riskier stream as the league gets shallower.

These are general recommendations, and your league situation will carry more weight whether you are protecting ratios or chasing counting numbers. This is for standard 5×5 roto leagues. The thresholds for H2H starts are generally lower, especially in points leagues so I thought there would be more value focusing on roto and then you can generally expand these recommendations a bit for points leagues.