Happy Post-All-Star Break, Razzball faithful!

Welcome to the “unofficial” second half of the 2025 Fantasy Baseball season!

I hope you all had a restful All-Star Break. It was tough sledding to gather up enough information from a handful of games this past weekend, so you’ll see some of my notes from the daily round-up that I did on Saturday.

For today, I got to thinking, so I floated an idea to Truss.

A few weeks ago, a friend asked if I would create an AL-Only and NL-Only list of the Top 50 starters in each league to spotlight names and rankings for those managers who play in leagues that draw from a single pool of players. I thought it was a good idea, and Truss agreed.

So, for this week and next week, I’ll be changing up the format for our mono-leaguers for the next two weeks. This week will draw from the American League pool of starters.

I nearly used a straight list from the Rest of Season Player Rater rankings. BUT, after reviewing the Top 50 ROS, I realized that I had to take the robot to task and use it as part of the process instead of just copying and pasting the entire thing. 

At first glance, I immediately knew what needed to happen.

I needed to fight the robot. 

In every technology Marmo-battle, Photoshop remains undefeated.

A “Marmo Vs The Machine” Deathmatch, if you will.

I’ll give you the screenshot of the Top 50-ish Rest Of Season Player Rater here (sorted for 12-Team AL-Only) and give you a hint of what kind of bizarro binary brain I realized I was working with when I first peeked into this week’s format changeup.

Before you get your tasers and flamethrowers loaded up and come screaming into battle with me, just pause and take a breath. I can assure you that I’ll be using that list for just a small part of the input to the process. In the end, the rankings will be my own with a bit of influence from the battery-operated biped.

Oh, and there’s one final piece of information to add! I’ll keep my regular Jumpers and Dumpers sections here, but this week I’ll use them a bit differently than we usually do.

The Jumpers will have Starting Pitchers that I think should “jump” up the ROS Player Rater much higher than they are ranked.

The Dumpers will be the opposite. Which Starting Pitchers are ranked higher than they should be, based on a few different criteria? Yep. That’s the gist.

But, as always, before we get to the list, I need to remind you to lock in your Razzball Fantasy Baseball Subscription. This should be your go-to reference for the entire season. The Streamonator is also a helpful resource when making lineup decisions. Rudy’s tools are well worth the price of admission. 

So, without further ado…

The Top (not quite) 100 AL-ONLY Starting Pitchers for (The Rest Of) 2025

 

SP RANK	Name	Team	ROS PLAYER RATER RANKING	Notes
1	Tarik Skubal	DET	1	This is the calm before the storm. The robot and I have agreed to sit down for a nice cup of tea. There was a nice “Bits and Bytes” party snack mix joke in the queue for this one until I did some quick research and found that B&B is a Canadian snack. Much love to the Tigers fans in Windsor, Ontario, I guess.
2	Garrett Crochet	BOS	8	More below.
3	Max Fried	NYY	7	He’s hit the skids a bit since being hammered by the Jays on Canada Day (July 1st), but I’m assuming the blister is the main reason why he’s allowed 10 ER in his last 14 IP (3 GS). Monitor for sure, but he’s a Top 5 AL-Only ROS option at the very least.
4	Jacob deGrom	TEX	23	More below.
5	Bryan Woo	SEA	14	You mean I get to write up the AL-Only SP list AND watch Bryan Woo (yesterday in HOU) at the same time?! I know this isn’t Iowa, so I must be in heaven. EDIT: Heaven was filled with more earned runs than I would have liked to see (6 IP, 4 ER, 6 H, 1 BB, 6 Ks, and 2 HR allowed). And, of course, he was a Jumper in last week’s article.
6	Hunter Brown	HOU	6	Yesterday’s Brown/Woo matchup was anti-climactic as Hunter didn’t do all that much better than the Woo-bot did. 4 IP, 3 ER, 6 H, 2 BB, 7 Ks. It took him 89 pitches to finish 4 innings, too.
7	Framber Valdez	HOU	3	The King of Quality Starts is a favorite of the Player Rater, and I can’t really argue it. I prefer the 6 names above him here, but in a QS league, Framber is a Top 3 SP. (14 QS in 19 GS).
8	Joe Ryan	MIN	4	This is the first name that I’ll acknowledge might be on a different team in two weeks. Take this list (and next week’s) with a grain of salt. The Trade Deadline will likely mean some of these guys change squads and leagues.
9	Carlos Rodon	NYY	9	Another guy where the ROS Player Rater and I match up. If you had told me way back in February that Rodon would be tied for 2nd in the league with 10 wins and have the 7th highest K/9 (10.15), by the All-Star break…I would’ve had a tough time believing you.
10	Kris Bubic	KC	37	More below.
11	Logan Gilbert	SEA	2	More below.
12	George Kirby	SEA	5	More below.
13	Nathan Eovaldi	TEX	10	This one could blow up on us in a bad way. Eovaldi has been filthy all year with pristine ratios and the second-highest K/BB rate (6.71) behind Tarik Skubal. That sounds pretty awesome, no? Well, he was scratched with back soreness yesterday and has already missed a month with a triceps injury this year. Someone flip the yellow “Caution” light on.
14	Seth Lugo	KC	15	“6 IP, 5 ER, 8 H, 0 BB, 5 Ks and the no-decision. Almost a half dozen earned runs must have just killed that ERA, no? Well, yes, that’s a no. It’s at 2.94 now. And his WHIP is 1.08.” And that’s me quoting me from Saturday morning’s round-up!
15	Luis Castillo	SEA	11	“6.2 IP, 0 ER, 3 H, 2 BB, 7 Ks, and the win (ERA at 3.21). As good as Walter was, Castillo was even better. I watched this one while I punched up the (Saturday) notes, and both guys were straight up dealing. Castillo won his third in a row, and if you haven’t bought back in yet, I’m starting to think the window will be closing pretty fast. He’s allowed four earned runs (total) over his last four starts.” Seriously. He looked like he had that old swagger back from his Cincy days. I’m starting to put trade offers together, yo!
16	Casey Mize	DET	44	This guy has more naysayers than a barn full of horses. Those people were likely happy with his final start before the break (3 IP, 6 ER, 6 H, 1 BB, 4 Ks), but he’s piling up wins and giving us acceptable ratios along the way.
17	Lucas Giolito	BOS	65	More below.
18	Jack Flaherty	DET	18	Believe it or not, I made my rankings and then cross-referenced to see what the robot had. Some lined up perfectly.
19	Ryan Pepiot	TB	25	He’s winless in three, and got roughed up by BAL for 3 HR and 5 ER yesterday. The 8 Ks were a nice bonus, but the Player Rater might have me on this one.
20	Shane Baz	TB	29	Pepiot’s rotation-mate is also winless in his last three starts, but the K/9 is almost identical (8.75 to Pepiot’s 8.83). This week looked like an auto-start because he gets CWS at home. In weekly leagues, it’s a bit more complicated. He heads to CIN on the weekend for a second start. FWIW, I’m still starting him. No Ragrets.
21	Noah Cameron	KC	58	The robot is downright insulting with this guy. I’ll defer to the boss for this quote: “ 6 2/3 IP, 0 ER, 9 baserunners, 8 Ks, ERA at 2.31. Just gotta keep out-performing your peripherals. It’s Parliamentary, my dear Cameron.” That’s from Grey’s July 13th round-up. Maybe I have him too high here, but I think a combination of KC injury issues and trade deadline moves at least leaves him with a regular turn every 5 days.
22	Yusei Kikuchi	LAA	16	The good news is he’s undefeated in his last six starts. The bad news is he only has 2 wins to show for it. 8 QS in 21 GS isn’t great, but the robot and I aren’t too far off from one another here.
23	Will Warren	NYY	43	It’s been said a few times before, and I remember Grey and BDon discussing it on a podcast. The Player Rater does not favor rookie pitchers, regardless of their pedigree. Will Warren is no exception. Saturday’s debacle in ATL (3.2 IP, 5 ER, 5 H, 3 BB, 2 Ks, 2 HR allowed) doesn’t help my ranking out.
24	Kevin Gausman	TOR	12	For as much as the robot hates the Yankees, it lurves the Blue Jays. I assume its ranking of Gausman is because it heard about his killer splitter and got excited about someone coming to reroute its circuitry.
25	Tanner Bibee	CLE	13	I had a lede all set for Bibee this week, but thankfully, things went in another direction. The coincidence here is that it is exactly what a majority of Bibee’s pitches do when he’s trying to throw strikes. Go in another direction. My SP25 ranking is based more on hope than reality.
26	Trevor Rogers	BAL	63	More below.
27	Jacob Lopez	ATH	54	The Player Rater took this rookie’s peripherals, put them into the algorithm, and added its patented ‘anti-rookie’ calculations before spitting out a ranking that has him below Tanner Houck and Kutter Crawford. Yep. That’s for the rest of THIS season. Smh.
28	Gavin Williams	CLE	40	I assumed that the robot would get confused and think that Gavin’s high BB rate (5.0) was extra Gigabytes of RAM. Nope. We’re doomed. The AI is learning and adapting.
29	Bryan Bello	BOS	34	Hey-o, Bello! Bello took a bit of a K.O. at Wrigley Saturday (6 IP, 3 ER, 6 H, 1 BB, 4 Ks) to break his 3-game winning streak.
30	Reese Olson	DET	27	“5 IP, 0 ER, 2 H, 1 BB, 6 Ks, ERA at 2.71 at Patrick Corbin 5.2 IP, 0 ER, 3 H, 2 BB, 6 Ks, ERA at 3.91. Don’t anyone tell Taj Bradley and Charlie Morton that THIS is how the new school vs old school matchup was supposed to go. Ooh, baby, it’s a wild world.” See Taj Bradley’s note below.
31	Michael Wacha	KC	26	On Saturday, Wacha picked right up where he left off before the break. 6 IP, 1 ER, 3 H, 1 BB, 1 K, and back-to-back no decisions. 2 ER in his last 11 IP.
32	Jack Leiter	TEX	66	Another upside-based hopeful vs the robot’s rookie prejudice. Will Jack Leiter be a Top 30 SP the rest of the way? Maybe not, but I’d bet a lot of money that he’s at least a Top 50 AL guy if he stays healthy and active.
33	Jose Berrios	TOR	19	Another Toronto boost from the machine? Well, at least now we know which country the Player Rater’s new CPU came from. Probably because it came at a 30% discount based on the exchange rates.
34	Taj Bradley	TB	22	“6 IP, 0 ER, 3 H, 1 BB, 6 Ks, ERA at 4.35 vs Charlie Morton 5.1 IP, 7 ER, 8 H, 3 BB, 4 Ks, ERA at 5.58. It was a real-life rendition of Yusuf Cat Stevens’ “Father and Son” last night. The only problem was the youngster still told the old guy where to go, and the old guy had used up all the juice from the fountain of youth before he bottled it and sent it to George Springer.”
35	Zack Littell	TB	52	I was a little *hee hee* hesitant to keep him up this high, but the K/BB sealed the deal. Among qualified AL starters, his 4.88 ranks 4th.
36	Jose Soriano	LAA	30	7 IP, 2 ER, 6 H, 2 BB, 5 Ks, AT PHI! This guy needs to be added to the Jekyll and Hyde list.
37	Brandon Walter	HOU	41	“6 IP, 1 ER, 3 H, 1 BB, 7 Ks, and the loss. ERA at 3.66. This was the kind of youngster vs veteran matchup that we wanted to see. Walter made one mistake to Randy Arozarena (more on that below), and it cost him a win. Other than that, he threw a great game.”
38	Chris Bassitt	TOR	20	More below.
39	Adrian Houser	CWS	103	It felt kind of icky putting Houser ahead of guys like Slade Cecconi and Max Scherzer, but he’s been pitching great and hasn’t shown any signs of slowing down.
40	David Festa	MIN	64	Dave Festa…Forever…Come on and Sing This Song…All Night Long! Just don’t ask the Siri/Google/Alexa robot to give you any information about Festa’s outlook. It’ll go something like this: “A second half upside pitcher? With a 5.25 ERA? Searching…file not found…error”.
41	Slade Cecconi	CLE	48	“8.1 IP, 6 ER, 8 H, 0 BB, 2 Ks, and his 5th win. Sure, the earned runs aren’t pretty, and the strikeouts would look a lot nicer with at least another half dozen tagged on, but Cecconi didn’t give up half of those runs until the 9th inning. 107 pitches tells us Cleveland has an awful lot of faith in the young righty, too.”
42	Eric Lauer	TOR	59	Ok, so here’s the one Blue Jay pitcher the robot doesn’t like. Maybe it thinks he’s still pitching in Korea.
43	Spencer Arrighetti	HOU	51	He threw three scoreless innings in a Double-A rehab start on Saturday. He’ll keep building up strength, but could be back at the end of July.
44	Max Scherzer	TOR	35	The Player Rater ranks Max Scherzer, then Bryce Miller, then Kris Bubic. O…*walks from Quebec to Tofino, British Columbia*…Kay.
45	Richard Fitts	BOS	102	Dick Fitts doesn’t slide into the robot’s Top 100. Don’t ask too many questions about why that’s the case. Just know that its CD-ROM drive is no longer operational.
46	Charlie Morton	BAL	45	Nearly identical ratings for Grandpa Charlie. He gave up 7 ER in 5.1 IP on Friday night, and I have a bad feeling that Charlie’s “low-grade tendinitis” might make both me and the robot look silly on this one when all is said and done.
47	Zebby Matthews	MIN	55	There’s been more than a couple of whispers from baseball pundits predicting a big second half from Zebby. The Twins called him up on Friday, and he promptly laid a rotten egg (4 IP, 5 ER, 8 H, 1 BB, 6 Ks). It was in Colorado, so let’s give him a pass. He gets WSH at home this week.
48	Drew Rasmussen	TB	32	He would be at least 30 spots higher in this list if the Rays committed to giving him a regular workload as an SP the rest of the way.
49	Joe Boyle	TB	98	CTL-C, CTRL-V the above note in here.
50	Bryce Miller	SEA	36	He’s headed out for rehab games starting this week, and can be activated from the IL on August 1st. It’s a best-case scenario thing here, and the threat of an “I-told-you-so” shutdown is very real. Monitor closely.
51	Cole Ragans	KC	17	More below.
52	Shane McClanahan	TB	39	Change the dates from Bryce Miller’s note above, and you’ve pretty much got McClanahan’s story. He’s thrown rehab games already, but isn’t able to return until August 5th. A bit of a fun fact: his last appearance in the major leagues was August 3rd, 2023. He could be back right after that second anniversary.
53	Cam Schlittler	NYY	95	One of us thinks he’s got some good upside and an electric strikeout-generating arm. The other one misinterpreted the speech-to-text autocorrect and ranked a pile of feces. Can you guess which is which?
54	Pablo Lopez	MIN	21	Full disclosure, I had Chris Paddack in here before my final edits. I had to convince myself that I’d rather take a chance on his teammate’s successful comeback instead. For the record, that was about as tough as convincing myself to avoid the milk found at the back of the fridge with an expiry date of August 2022.
56	Dean Kremer	BAL	33	Krispy Kremer has been ignored for much of the year by our human Starting Pitcher ranker (yep, that’s me). The robot was not impressed and ranked him in the 30s.
57	Kyle Bradish	BAL	125	More below.
58	Tyler Mahle	TEX	84	Scheduled to resume throwing this week.
59	Simeon Woods Richardson	MIN	60	Another one where the robot and I are pretty darned close. SWR has won three of his last four starts and sports a 1.47 ERA since June 15th. That sounds like he should be even higher, doesn’t it? Well…his XFIP over that same period was 5.10. There’s a hive full of regression fairies dangling above the home dugout of Target Field. And they’re getting increasingly agitated every time this guy takes the mound.
60	Bailey Ober	MIN	28	More below.
61	Luis Gil	NYY	62	Is throwing in the minors and may not need more than one rehab start before returning to NYY.

 

JUMPERS (These are some of the players who jumped up the MY rankings vs The ROS Player Rater)

Garrett Crochet (Marmo SP2, Player Rater SP8) – Another week, another dominant start from the Knight of Knitters. Crochet weaved his way through the Cubs at Wrigley on Saturday, threw a 6 IP, 1 ER, 8 H, 2 BB, 5 K, and sewed up another win to push his record to 10-4. That sounds like a guy who should be at least a Top 5 starter the rest of the way. It’s also a good spot to add this…

If someone asked me how many AL-Only SPs were on the Top 10 K-BB% leaderboard, I would not have said three. Oof.

Jacob deGrom (M SP4, PR SP23) – Let me get this straight, Mr. Robot. We’ve got a guy with more strikeouts than innings pitched; he’s proven to be healthy for the first time in years, posting solid ratios (ERA: 2.93; WHIP: 0.91), and you have TWENTY-TWO starting pitchers ranked ahead of him in the American League for the rest of the season? Did someone mix in some cannabutter when they changed the Player Rater’s oil this week?

Kris Bubic (M SP10, PR SP37) – Ok, I can almost get on board with this one. I have Bubic ranked high based on his incredible first half. After Saturday’s start in Miami (5 IP, 0 ER, 3 H, 1 BB, 2 Ks), he improved to 8-6 and has the 8th best K/9 in the AL (9.36) for qualified starting pitchers. The potential problem is that with 108.2 innings pitched, he’s just 21.1 IP away from a career high (in 2021). If he can keep up his stamina and carry his gains through 170-180 innings, he’ll make the robot look like a boomer still trying to program their VCR.

Lucas Giolito (M SP17, PR SP65) – This was one of a few notes I lifted from last Saturday’s Friday night recap. “5.1 IP, 4 ER, 5 H, 2 BB, 6Ks, and his 2nd loss. I was working in the backyard yesterday, so I watched the first two innings of this one after it started. Back-to-back full-count walks to Michael Busch and Kyle Tucker to start the bottom of the 1st was a bit worrisome, but Giolito’s command wasn’t off by all that much. Then the third Cubs hitter didn’t wait too long to mash the first pitch he saw (a 93 MPH FB up on the outside corner) for a big fly. Giolito didn’t give up much after that, but by that time, the damage was already done.” Bottom line? I’m becoming more of a Giolito fan, and the robot kind of hates him.

Trevor Rogers (M SP26, PR 63) – Was this robot built in Florida? Dunked in a vat of bath salts? A member of the Connor Norby fan club? Rogers rolled into Tampa yesterday and looked much like he did when he manhandled his former team in his final start before the break. 6 IP, 2 ER, 5 H, 2 BB, 3 Ks, his 3rd win and 3rd quality start in a row. The 8.15 K/9 could use a boost, but he’s rolling out the lowest BB/9 of his career (2.55). I’d bet that he’s closer to my ranking than the Player Rater ranking by the end of the second half.

Kyle Bradish (M SP57, PR SP125) – This might be more wishful thinking on my part, but he threw a simulated game last week with no problems. The internal brace procedure is always a scary one, but Bradish should be good to go in about three weeks if he can build up stamina in the minors with a few rehab starts. He was awesome last year before the injury, so the potential to come back strong is there. I’m willing to roll the dice on him if he’s a free (or low-cost) add in a deep league.

DUMPERS (With apologies to Cal Raleigh, these are some of the big dumpers that dropped down my rankings vs The ROS Player Rater)

Logan Gilbert (M SP11, PR SP2) – The Player Rater’s SP2 for the rest of the season. I won’t argue it much, because if Gilbert is fully healthy, he should be a Top 5 AL arm. He’s headed up my regular list with each strong outing, but I can’t have him ranked ahead of guys like deGrom, Fried, and Crochet with what they’ve done already this year (and continue to do).

George Kirby (M SP12, PR SP5) – The 9.33 K/9 is on par with what we’ve come to expect from Kirby, but the 12 walks in 56 innings are uncharacteristic. It’s silly to say that a 2.0 BB/9 is bad, but it’s the highest he’s posted in his 4 years in the big leagues. George is a solid arm and an ace if he’s fully healthy. My question is more about the latter than it is the former. He gets Brandon Woodruff and the Brewers today.

Chris Bassitt (M SP38, PR SP20) – “ 6.1 IP, 0 ER, 10 (!) H, 0 BB, 5 Ks, and the win. Let’s play the game again. Can you guess this guy’s record? If you said 10-4, then you’re spinning more magic than the guy who allowed ten hits and still threw a shutout into the 7th inning. That’s a yes from me, dawg.” That was my note from Friday night’s recap. It’s a good way to highlight how much the robot values wins in its calculations. The underlying numbers aren’t excellent with Bassitt, but the Blue Jays are scorching hot these days, and I’d be comfortable starting any of their starters (as long as their names don’t rhyme with Schmancis or Schmanoah). Apparently, the Player Rater agrees.

Cole Ragans (M SP51, PR SP17) – Ragans was moved from the 15-day IL to the 60-day IL before the break. But the robot thinks he’s a Top 20 AL pitcher the rest of the way? Come on, now. As much as I would love him to come back healthy and ready to cruise through 2.5 months for my TGFBI team, I just don’t see it happening. If the robot thinks Ragans will give us a full second half and post a 15.0 K/9 the rest of the way, there’s a piece of rusty sheet metal floating in a pond in our local forest that I’ll tab as a tropical island and transfer ownership for 100 bitcoins.

Bailey Ober (M SP60, PR SP28) – There’s a theme here. The robot is blind to injury reports and thinks everyone will be back with a clean bill of health. Oh, to have the optimism of that Bucket of Bolts.

STUMPERS (These names might stump you as to why they aren’t on the list.)

Grayson Rodriguez (24)

JP Sears (31)

Luis Severino (38)

Tyler Anderson (42)

Bowden Francis (46)

Jeffrey Springs (47)

Zach Eflin (49)

Tanner Houck (53)

Chris Paddack (56)

Kumar Rocker (57)

Luis L. Ortiz (69)

Walker Buehler (70)

Lance McCullers Jr. (71)

Tomoyuki Sugano (73)

Kyle Harrison (80)

Kyle Hendricks (88)

Ryan Gusto (93)

Michael Lorenzen (94)

Shane Smith (100)

Jordan Hicks (105)

 

That’s all for Round One this week! I hope you enjoyed it! Let me know your thoughts about the 2nd half AL-Only rankings, and which names you think should be in here in the list (or in the pile of Stumpers).

Don’t forget to come back next Monday for Round 2 when the robot and I battle over our NL-Only names for the Rest Of Season rankings.

Have a great week!

Follow me @marmosdad on Twitter/X and Bluesky @marmosdad.bsky.social