He led the American League in FIP two years back, finishing fourth in Cy Young voting, and his mildly depressed strikeout rate isn’t that big a deal when you combine it with elite control (1.6 BB/9). Nobody expected Eovaldi to pitch like the ace the Rangers are paying Jacob deGrom to be, but it’s not like Eovaldi hasn’t been elite before. Stroman helps himself with a juicy ground-ball bias and plus control, and he’s one of the smartest pitchers around. Stroman’s 2.39 ERA doesn’t match his 3.68 圎RA, but this would be the fourth straight year he has beaten that metric, so perhaps it’s part of his profile. We still have to note that his strikeout rate, walk rate and velocity are worse than his established levels, but I can’t drop him from the first tier yet, not when recent results are encouraging. Maybe it’s a game of arbitrary endpoints, but Burnes has rebounded somewhat after two terrible starts to open the year.

Consistency is lovely when you find it at this position. He has allowed three earned runs or fewer in 11 of 12 turns, and his only miss was an eight-strikeout game. Valdez isn’t a strikeout wizard like most of these other aces, but he has solid control and induces ground balls by the bushel. Strider also enjoys the backdrop of the NL’s most talented roster. Score one for two-pitch pitchers, showing that if those offerings are dominant enough, a third pitch isn’t needed.

Granted, he did strike out 14.6 batters per nine, coincidentally his rate for this season in the majors. I’d love to know how Strider’s one minor-league season played out this way: 3-7 record, 3.64 ERA over 22 games.

I’ll link to previous shuffles at the bottom, with their publish dates. I did not price anyone on the injured list I’m no doctor, and the level of injury optimism is highly variable from fantasy manager to fantasy manager. Your list will look different, of course. My salaries are unscientific in nature, meant primarily to show how I rank the players and, more specifically, where the clusters of talent are. Use it to evaluate your team, consider pickups and drops, grade trade offers - it’s up to you. What you see below is how I would arrange the starting pitchers if I were entering a new draft today.

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