In preparation for my annual Top 400 Starting Pitchers ranking article in February 2026, I spend the fall and winter months thoroughly reviewing every team’s rotation, taking the time to analyze every piece of the pitcher, and writing my analysis months in advance. I usually don’t share these publicly until then, and in the last two years, I elected to share them exclusively with PL Pro members.
PL Pro members get four major benefits inside these articles:
1. Early Ranking Access
As I go through each team, I rank each pitcher relative to the other pitchers I have already covered inside a Google Spreadsheet. While I often change these throughout the winter even after completing their write-up, PL Pro members have access to view the progress of those rankings before they are made public.
2. 2026 Player Projections, powered by PLV
At the start of each write-up, you can view each player’s Pitcher List player projection for 2026, powered by PLV. These projections matched hitters alongside BatX in 2025 and performed exceptionally well across the Top 200 SP. They even beat me in the daily streamer challenge by one. So close.
3. Nick’s Starting Pitcher Sheet – The One Sheet for all Pitcher Research
With the help of Kyle Bland, I have a Team SP one-sheet that provides all the relevant data on every pitcher for each team featured in these articles. Here is the example for the Arizona Diamondbacks:
It’s the ultimate resource for your personal SP research. I cannot express enough how helpful it is to have everything in one place.
4. Ad-Free Experience
Read these without any ads and without a sidebar. It looks so much better.
So many more additions outside these articles
Live Draft Assistant app (just updated to 2.0!), access to our 1,500+ member Discord, all our apps, and so much more.
Get Two Months of PL Pro FREE!
Use promo code SPBREAKDOWNS26 and get $40 off PL Pro Yearly ($120 value of PL Pro monthly!):
Expected Starters
Matthew Liberatore (LHP)
2025 Stats: 151.2 IP | 4.21 ERA | 1.31 WHIP | 18.8 K% | 6.2 BB%
I guess Liberatore is the ace of the staff. Oh how the turntables. I can’t tell you that I’m particularly enthused about Liberatore’s prospective 2026 campaign leading the staff, but there are clear signs that he could be better than he has been, turning into a standard Toby or even a Holly if everything clicks right. How much is everything. It’s a lot, just ask PL senior analyst Nate Schwartz next time you run into him. His 94 mph four-seamer fluctuates its velocity from start to start, ranging from 92+ and peaking at 95 mph, but regardless of heat, it’s mediocre. He keeps it away to LHB to little success and poor strike rates, while it’s far too hittable to RHB as he casually hurls it over the plate. At least there’s a sinker to LHB that generated, checks notes, one whiff on 122 thrown to LHB last season and has abysmal movement. Maybe it’s because, oh I don’t know, it had 1st percentile inside location to LHB. I just don’t understand that. Aren’t the Cardinals old-school and teach the inside sinker? Times have changed, old man. Yes, the four-seamer had an excellent ICR to LHB, but it was due to its few batted balls (56% strike rate!), and it won’t stick. What may stick are the secondaries.
Liberatore’s slider, cutter, and curveball are solid against LHB. The curve is tugged a bit more than I’d like, but the slider and cutter land away with ease and generate whiffs aplenty + weak contact. Keep doing that and just throw the sinker inside. Please.
Liberatore could be a SWATCH, but that requires him to have a tight changeup, of course, and I don’t believe he does. His slowball has 8th percentile drop at 88 mph and is not a weapon feared by RHB. As a result, he throws it nearly exclusively early in the count, returning a ton of balls in play that find gloves often (.172 BABIP last year with just -3 hit luck is great!), turning to the slider for punchouts. The problem is the stuff in-between: poor four-seamers, curveballs that still hold a sub 60% strike rate, and an inconsistent feel for the cutter. We’ve seen moments where it all comes together, but even then, the stuff isn’t all that impressive. He needs peak command to be that Toby rock we want him to be, especially with a whole lot of potential volume coming his way. I need to see a significant improvement before hanging my hat on this.
Quick Take: Liberatore has the opportunity to be a volume arm in 15-teamers, but he needs more consistency and precision to settle down in your 12-teamer rotations. The changeup is far from what we like from southpaws, and his sinker is misused against LHB, forming a mold of an odd lefty who I don’t want to latch onto.
Dustin May (RHP)
2025 Stats: 132.1 IP | 4.96 ERA | 1.42 WHIP | 21.1 K% | 9.6 BB%
Boy, I sure was in on May entering April last year. He was fully recovered from TJS and his horrific esophagus injury and ready to soak innings for the Dodgers, displaying 97/98 mph velocity the last time we saw him. Welp, he wasn’t close to the same arm when he returned. May sat 94-96 mph across the season and failed to find an approach he could replicate for success. Early on, it became a whole bunch of sinkers and sweepers, the former failing to get inside enough, and the latter featuring fantastic sweeper and depth at 85 mph, allowing him to keep his head above water but not find his footing. After experimenting with changeups, cutters, and four-seamers in the mix, May ended the year in September with an injury, ending a disappointing season for everyone involved – especially Red Sox fans. I still can’t believe that trade happened.
And yet, I’m kinda interested. That’s ridiculous. I know, it is. That said, is there a better landing spot for May than the Cardinals? They generally have an above-average defense and play in a great pitcher’s park, and May will have a long leash each outing without a single breath on his neck to instill fear of losing his gig. Maybe he changes his arm slot again to find the 96+ mph velocity, or maybe he gets the feel for the sinker or cutter. I don’t know, I simply imagine May wouldn’t be exactly the same as last year. Perhaps another year removed from TJS provides a better opportunity to get into rhythm, especially with a normal off-season and no concern of job security. Upside hunting starts with opportunity and past success, and what do you know, Dustin could check into your lineups by…late April.
Quick Take: May was a massive disappointment in 2025. The Cardinals present him with a phenomenal opportunity for a rebound season, and I wouldn’t overlook the chance he finds a rhythm locating his pitches and taking advantage of his lively sweeper, cutter, and sinker movement. He’s a sleeper in 15-teamers and deeper, while 12-team managers can sit back and wait for a good time to strike.
Andre Pallante (RHP)
2025 Stats: 162.2 IP | 5.31 ERA | 1.44 WHIP | 15.5 K% | 8.7 BB%
Pallante intrigues me, but not in a way that has me wanting to draft him. No, it’s that he’s incredibly unique. He throws a four-seamer that’s really a cutter (94/95 mph with -1.3″ horizontal break but 9.3″ vert) and a sinker that’s really a four-seamer. There’s also an 87 mph slider with a wide range of poor drop and stellar drop (6″ to -6″!), and a big curveball at 78 mph that really shouldn’t be featured. But that cut-fastball! It works really well, limiting both LHB and RHB to sub 40% ICR marks as he incessantly throws it confidently in the zone. And even though the sinker doesn’t really do much of anything, its difference in movement at the same velocity startled RHB for just a 21% ICR last season at 25% usage. That’s great! Sure is! If only that slider could earn more strikes and whiffs, and if only he had something outside of the fastball for LHB. Sigh. I should mention – Pallante was really unlucky last season. To see a guy with 96th percentile ICR have 5th percentile LOB rate and 18th percentile hit rate is not right. Sure, failing to strikeout batters is part of the problem, but with a 60% groundball rate, he really should find more double plays this year.
If Pallante can find a way to earn more strikes (and hopefully whiffs) with his slider, there’s a shot for something cool. He has the weak contact part down, now he needs something to putaway batters at a decent 20% rate. That’s it.
Quick Take: Pallante’s lively cut-fastball is a great pitch that generates a whole lot of weak contact, but doesn’t miss bats and lacks support from secondaries to become a crafty Toby. There’s still time for him to figure out the slider or another offering, though the floor is too low at the moment to chase this in most leagues.
On The Fringe
Michael McGreevy (RHP)
2025 Stats: 95.2 IP | 4.42 ERA | 1.25 WHIP | 14.5 K% | 5.0 BB%
I’ll always have a soft spot for sinker-first command arms. McGreevy features the pitch 40% of the time to RHB with sub 3″ of vert (a legit sinker!) and a 24% ICR at nearly 80% strikes creates 98th percentile STR-ICR. That’s hot. There’s more strikeout upside than it may seem with McGreevy failing to get a great feel for his breaking pitches last year, and if he can nail down the sweeper’s spots just a bit better, he could turn the 14% putaway rate to 20-25%, which would let his strikeout rate push toward 20%. That’s all he needs with his low walk rate and ability to suppress hard contact…against RHB. It’s a different story for LHB, where the sinker can’t live and the four-seamer comes into play. I question if he really needs to. Legit sinkers can live down-and-away effectively to opposite-handed batters, especially with a changeup underneath it. At least he’s leaning into an 88/89 mph cutter to help deal with the issue. Given his ability to spot his fastballs with ease, I want to believe McGreevy can continue to grow in the Cardinals’ rotation, and I’d be surprised if he isn’t given the shot out of the gate. He’s a streamer in 12-teamers against poor lineups and a possible ratio streamer in 15-teamers, though the strikeouts may take some time to develop, inflating his ERA and WHIP until he crosses the 18%+ strikeout threshold.
Quick Take: There’s a Toby in McGreevy, whose fastball command paired with legit sink can generate outs in a flash. He needs to do more with his breakers to find strikeouts and avoid getting Singled Out on a given night. He could take that step forward across the long season if he’s given the long runway he deserves.
Kyle Leahy (RHP)
2025 Stats: 88.0 IP | 3.07 ERA | 1.23 WHIP | 22.0 K% | 7.7 BB%
As an analyst, I’ve evolved a ton over my 10+ years running Pitcher List (jeez, it started in 2014?!), and one of my most recent adaptations is learning to quickly read pitch movement plots like Cypher reading off strings of the Matrix. Good ride, worthless cutter, filthy slider, what on Earth is this dot doing here?! I’ve been going through every pitcher with my one-sheets, teaching myself what to expect and what jumps out, and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing looking at Kyle’s pitch movement plot. I just finished writing about Braxton Ashcraft and praising his 92 mph slider with fantastic movement at that velocity, allowing him to feature Empty Velocity four-seamers and considering room for growth if he could harness the feel of his hard two-plane curveballs. This is Ashcraft’s movement chart. See the purple right along the middle line? You normally see sliders there around 88 mph for stellar ones, 85 mph for the normies. A 90+ mph slider that has proper bend and not at a stupid low arm angle is incredibly rare. Welp, I guess it’s not so rare as this is Kyle’s movement chart. It’s the same picture. He even has the same curveball down there!
And here I was thinking the Cardinals didn’t have anyone all too interesting this season. Not only does Leahy have the slider and the curve, he also has a sweeper! And more interesting four-seamer movement! But before I went off shouting from the cliffs about the latest sleeper, there are two major concerns. First, Leahy’s command isn’t quite there yet. As much as I want to praise the stuff in his arm, it doesn’t work if he isn’t setting up and locating properly, and watching the 2-3 inning outings showcased an arm who still hadn’t harnessed his curve, sweeper, slider, and cut-fastball quite yet. Wait, two-to-three innings? He’s not a starter? Annnd there’s number two. This was in relief. If Leahy is stretched out to start as we expect, it’s unlikely he keeps his velocity at 95/96 mph, which means these breakers fall back from Elite to Great. That’s obviously still, uh, great, but merged with the command question, my brain has finally caught up to my heart to ensure it slows down. FINE. I’ll just be excited for Leahy to get legs in the rotation and hope the breakers become legit strike pitches and don’t lose too much velo in the process.
Quick Take: Leahy’s breakers are legit, but we haven’t seen what his stuff looks like when he has to make it work for 5+ frames. I’m incredibly curious to see if he can pull it off. If he gets the green light to start in the Cardinals’ rotation, you should monitor the progress.
Richard Fitts (RHP)
2025 Stats: 45.0 IP | 5.00 ERA | 1.31 WHIP | 20.5 K% | 8.2 BB%
I have to imagine the Cardinals will want Fitts (and Dobbins) in the rotation when they showcase full health, and they both may have the best stuff on the squad when all is said and done. If Fitts gets a rotation spot, I’m interested in 15-teamers with his 96 mph cut-action four-seamer and trio of lively breakers, with the potential for a 12-teamer pickup if he’s looking solid out of the gate. I hope he turns to the sinker over the four-seamer to RHB – the cut action on the four-seamer with poor vert is exactly what RHB want up in the zone – and adjusts the four-seamer to go inside to LHB instead of trying to backdoor them. Those simple tweaks to fastball approach may be all he needs. It’s not like he has poor pitches in his mix. They just need to be utilized a bit better.
Quick Take: Fitts is kinda cool. 96 mph cut-fastballs should eat up LHB if they land inside, while his sinker should be fine inside to RHB + sliders, sweepers, and curveballs show potential for strikeouts against both LHB and RHB. There’s fine-tuning to be done to get the most out of his stuff, and I’m curious to see how he looks once he gets a firm rotation spot.
Names To Know
Hunter Dobbins (RHP)
Dobbins’ 2025 season came to an end with a torn ACL and it’s unclear when he’ll be fully ramped up for the season. I imagine he’ll be held back a bit before getting a rotation spot, and when he does get an opportunity, I’m not sure I like him over Fitts. Think of the same velocity but worse fastball command, made up by registering more horizontal movement on everything due to a slightly lower arm slot and a better feel for spin. I’m not gonna lie, you had me in the first half. I’m often worried about younger arms without the ability to locate fastballs well without absurd velocity and Dobbins’ heater gets pummeled without a sinker to save it against RHB. The slider, curve, and sweeper are more effective, though I worry too much about getting to those pitches deeper in counts. He needs help in the arsenal, and I’ll pay attention when he finds it.
Dobbins will likely be out of the rotation to begin the season after recovering from a torn ACL, though the Cardinals are sure to grant him a spot once he fully recovers. The arsenal comes with solid breaking pitches destined for whiffs, but his poor four-seamer command will anchor him from leaving port and sailing toward 12-team rotations.
Relevant Prospects
Thanks to MLB.com and Eric Longenhagen’s work at FanGraphs for many insights into these prospects. I also used our PLV Minor League Player App for additional data I couldn’t find elsewhere.
For pitchers in Triple-A, our PL Pro MiLB app was an invaluable resource, gathering all velocity, movement, extension, and HAVAA marks with ease. For example, here’s Kohl Drake’s Triple-A slider card this season inside the app. Unlock this app and many more with PL Pro.
Quinn Mathews (LHP, 25, AAA) – Watch Video
I absolutely loved Mathews in spring last season, looking like a workhorse SWATCH who could induce weak contact, work at-bats, and then he went to the minors, went on the IL for shoulder soreness, and never found a lengthy groove. He had a moment in August before ending the season with four straight games of 4+ walks, and I cannot tell you he’ll be fine in 2026. The changeup, slider, and curve look to be the proper package to go with a 94 mph heater, but time will tell if he can be the reliable volume arm in the majors.
Sem Robberse (RHP, 24, AAA) – Watch Video
He was non-tendered and re-signed and to me, he’s the Sem old, Sem old guy who goes sweeper/cutter heavy and I’m not interested in his 92 mph heater from the right side. Move along.
Tekoah Roby (RHP, 24, AAA) – Watch Video
Just when I started to get back into Roby with a tight arsenal he was able to replicate often and living in their distinct movement islands, he had elbow issues and will miss all of 2026 recovering from TJS. Welp, maybe one day.
Tink Hence (RHP, 23, AA) – Watch Video
We had a lost 2025 season for Hence, enduring a rib strain and shoulder issues that limited him to just 21.1 frames. The hope is for Hence to feature 95 mph at a low arm angle with solid breakers and a disgusting changeup, and we hope he can get it back to become a starter for the Cardinals later this year. Don’t hold your breath. It’s uncommon for prospects after lost seasons who haven’t seen Triple-A to suddenly be fantasy targets the following year unless they have peak stuff (Grant Taylor).
Jurrangelo Cijntje (LHP / RHP, 22, AA) – Watch Video
Oh hey! It’s the switch-pitcher! The Mariners had announced they would have Cijntje focus as an RHP, where he can sit mid-to-upper 90s with a strong slider and changeup. Looking above at all the other options in the Cardinals’ system, we may see Cijntje appear this year and he may be of interest. I’m excited to see what the data gives us in the spring and if Quinn and Hence are lacking, Cijntje may be the first legit call-up to start and hopefully stick.
Cooper Hjerpe (LHP, 24, AA) – Watch Video
He’s a strange one. Reminiscent of Rich Hill, Hjerpe gets a lot from his sidearm release, allowing him to get whiffs on 88-92 mph fastballs, a high 70s slider and slow changeup. He doesn’t have much experience above Single-A due to an elbow injury in the middle of 2024 that led to TJS in April 2025. Consider him a potential 2027 play for the Cardinals.
Chen-Wei Lin (RHP, 24, A+) – Watch Video
The Taiwanese native throws hard. Mid-to-upper 90s with the ability to reach triple digits, there is a bit of worry the heater has “empty velocity” (lacking good shape) that it’ll play worse than the eye test would suggest. Lin has an affinity for a legit changeup, though he’s shown growth with his slider becoming a proper weapon to RHB in his limited time in 2025 (cut short by a forearm issue. Yikes). Walks have been an annoyance and the arsenal isn’t fully in rhythm yet, but with his ability to hit the high 90s, there’s potential for growth before we grant the dreaded “Reliever risk” label.
Liam Doyle (LHP, 21, A+) – Watch Video
The fifth overall pick in the 2025 draft, Doyle could make a convincing argument early to jump levels and appear in the majors given the Cardinals’ lack of convincing arms across their system. He earned over a 40% strikeout rate in his final college season, and with a fastball that can hit 100 mph from the left side, it’s difficult to argue against his ability to face major league talent. That said, a mid-80s slider isn’t quite the breaker you want to see with that kind of velo, and his feel for pitch + his upper-80s cutter leaves a bit to be desired. If he gets the call this season, it’ll be due to dominance in the lower levels and should be an auto-add. In all likelihood, we don’t see him until 2027 at the earliest.
