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What a strange time it is for the art of starting pitching in Major League Baseball.
The narrative in recent years has been the loss of its primacy as a star attraction. Fewer innings go to starters in general, and no starters carry the epic workloads of their forebears. When the World Series is decided, if a starter is on the mound, it’s because he came out of the bullpen, as Walker Buehler did when he locked down the Los Angeles Dodgers’ championship in late October.
One hundred years ago, starting pitchers accounted for around 91% of all innings pitched and averaged just over eight innings per outing. Last season, starters threw 59% of all innings and averaged 5â…” frames.
And yet, financially speaking, it has never been a better time to be a bedrock starting pitcher. Just tally up the numbers from your favorite free agent tracker, like the one at FanGraphs.
As of New Year’s Eve, the total outlay for free agents was around $2.6 billion. It’s a rough figure that ignores exigencies such as opt-outs, but let’s go with that as a measure of potential aggregate contract value. Of that total, $1.2 billion has gone to starting pitchers. If you take Juan Soto out of the equation, starters have gotten 1.9 times more than all other positions combined.
Let’s put two and two together and make an outlandish suggestion: Even in 2025, baseball teams still value starting pitching. Its demise has been exaggerated, even while debates abound about how to restore the art to its former glory.
Most of the key dominoes in free agency have fallen now that Corbin Burnes has joined the Arizona Diamondbacks. Most, but not all: Possible impact starters such as Jack Flaherty, Japanese sensation Roki Sasaki and others are still out there.
Let’s take stock of the current rotation landscape in baseball, while keeping in mind that there is still plenty that can change. As with our look at offenses in the aftermath of the winter meetings, this is an in-the-moment snapshot of baseball’s top 10 rotations.
With so much work left to do, we’re not tying a team to a runs allowed forecast or anything that formalized, though specific projected numbers generate these ratings. Our method is outlined below.
Top 10 New Year’s Day rotations
Rotation index: 117.3
Ranks — Stars: 5 | Depth: 1 | Length: 1 | Dominance: 1
Top 6: 1. Logan Gilbert (Rating: 116), 2. Luis Castillo (109), 3. George Kirby (115), 4. Bryce Miller (108), 5. Bryan Woo (110), 6. Emerson Hancock (88)
Despite the Mariners’ chronic need for offense, Jerry Dipoto has so far resisted the temptation to thin his top-of-the-line rotation with a trade for a bat. There have been rumors, but when you see the drop-off from the core five to No. 6, you can see why Dipoto would be hesitant.
Despite that, Seattle tops the charts in rotation depth by this method simply because it has a dependable crew that is uniformly better than average. The depth rating isn’t necessarily about the number of good starters; it’s about how many above-average innings you can cover.
Few teams can match the Gilbert-Kirby combo, and it’s not hard to imagine any of Castillo, Miller or Woo joining them in the elite innings category. The group combines dominance (fifth-ranked strikeout percentage and top-ranked walk rate) and length (No. 1 in projected innings). It’s the full package.
Rotation index: 115.2
Ranks — Stars: 1 | Depth: 2 | Length: 2 | Dominance: 7
Top 6: 1. Zack Wheeler (Rating: 122), 2. Aaron Nola (111), 3. Cristopher Sanchez (111), 4. Ranger Suarez (111), 5. Jesus Luzardo (104), 6. Andrew Painter (104)
The Phillies match Seattle in most areas and exceed the Mariners in pure rotation star power. This is the case despite a modest innings projection for the talented Painter in his first season coming off an elbow injury.
The one area Seattle edges the Phillies is in hits per nine innings, which isn’t a heavily emphasized category, but it matters, especially when everything else is so close.
Last season, the Mariners ranked second in the majors in expected batting average, per Statcast, indicating just how much soft contact Seattle induced. The Phillies finished closer to the middle of the pack. Make no mistake though, this is a deep, dominant starting rotation, potentially the best in the National League.
Rotation index: 111.2
Ranks — Stars: 2 | Depth: 16 | Length: 4 | Dominance: 3
Top 6: 1. Chris Sale (Rating: 125), 2. Reynaldo Lopez (110), 3. Spencer Schwellenbach (110), 4. Spencer Strider (123), 5. Bryce Elder (96), 6. Ian Anderson (90)
We don’t know when Strider will be back, though the late update indicated that Opening Day was probably out of reach. By the end of the season, however, he and Sale might comprise the best one-two rotation combination of any club entering the playoffs.
The depth is held back by cautious innings projections for Strider, but also because there’s a dropoff after the top of the group. Anderson is just a placeholder and an unlikely one despite his name recognition. Others could easily jump over him on the depth chart and raise the ceiling of this group.
In particular, keep an eye on AJ Smith-Shawver and Hurston Waldrep. Both have work to do in turning potential into production, but the talent is there. The Braves are one team that could stand to bolster its depth from the pool of dangling free agents.
Rotation index: 110.5
Ranks — Stars: 3 | Depth: 13 | Length: 11 | Dominance: 2
Top 6: 1. Blake Snell (Rating: 121), 2. Yoshinobu Yamamoto (115), 3. Tyler Glasnow (124), 4. Shohei Ohtani (119), 5. Tony Gonsolin (96), 6. Dustin May (103)
We went with Gonsolin and May at the bottom of the Dodgers’ six-man rotation, though others — Landon Knack, Ben Casparius, Bobby Miller — could figure into the mix.
This is probably also a good place to highlight the possible impact of Sasaki, who could propel the Dodgers near the top of these rankings, or boost the fortunes of one of the teams below. The possibility is why the term