The value of the ace in Major League Baseball cannot be stated enough. Here are the top-10 pitchers in the league heading into the 2017 season.
With the exception of just one name on the following list of the best pitchers in Major League baseball, each has pitched in the postseason multiple times in his career. In football, it is impossible to win without an elite quarterback, and in baseball that can be said of an elite starting pitcher. These pitchers virtually guarantee their team 15-20 wins every single year, and give a team a big leg-up on the competition for a playoff berth.
Baseball saw a major shift back to the pitchers after the introduction of stringent testing for PED usage. It is no longer an uncommon occurrence to see multiple runs at sub-2.00 ERAs in a single season, and strikeouts continue to rise around the league. Hitters did make a bit of a push back to pre-testing levels with home runs up around the league in 2016, but the pitchers still hold the upper hand.
Teams like the Baltimore Orioles and Kansas City Royals have been able to win without a legitimate ace thanks to their strong bullpens, but sustaining a winner is difficult without a true frontline starter. Which ten pitchers rank at the top of baseball in 2017? Read on as we break them down.
10. Aaron Sanchez, Toronto Blue Jays
The Blue Jays have carefully managed the innings of their precocious right-hander Aaron Sanchez for the past two years. In his first full year as a starter in the big leagues, Sanchez was briefly shut down in the second half, but still won the AL ERA crown with a 3.00 mark over 192 frames. He also went 15-2 and led the league with the lowest home-run rate.
Sanchez’s best pitch is a heavy sinker thrown at 96 mph. He compliments that pitch with a four-seam fastball, a curve, and a changeup. Sanchez does not throw the changeup often, and could stand to throw it slightly slower if he wants to develop it into a reliable fourth pitch. His curve is already a dominant pitch, and he got 66 strikeouts with it last year.
If there is one area left for Sanchez to improve, it is in commanding his pitches. He walked 3.0 per nine last year, but that was a marked improvement from 2015. Pitchers who throw such heavy, sinking fastballs can sometimes go through bouts of wildness because their ball just moves too much and falls out of the zone. Jake Arrieta dealt with a similar issue before being traded to Chicago, and also ran into some control issues last year. Regardless, Sanchez emerged as a bonafide ace in 2016, and his future is very bright.
9. David Price, Boston Red Sox
David Price would certainly like a bit of a redo on his first season with the Red Sox. After signing a $217-million contract, Price opened the first two months of the season with a 5.11 ERA in 68.2 innings (further proving that the win is a worthless stat, Price was 7-1 despite the bloated ERA). Eventually, as an unsustainable home-run rate and BABIP fell, Price’s numbers began aligning better with his career norms.
The left-hander out of Vanderbilt has dealt with a lot over the past three seasons. He has been traded twice, and has played for four different teams. In 2017, Price will finally find some stability, and continuing to develop his relationship with Red Sox pitching coach Carl Willis and assistant Brian Bannister.
Price has lost a tick or two on his fastball and cutter as he enters his age-31 season, but he does still have the stuff to get by as a legitimate ace on a team that added a second one this offseason. He is a workhorse who was plagued by a bit of bad luck in 2016. A seven-year contract that will run past Price’s 37th birthday is a risky investment, but he has a few more years as a top-10 pitcher ahead of him.
8. Justin Verlander, Detroit Tigers
You don’t have to be engaged to Justin Verlander to think he has a legitimate gripe over losing the 2016 AL Cy Young to Rick Porcello. Last season, the big right-hander put to rest any talk that he was entering the twilight of his career with 227.2 dominant innings. Verlander led the league with 254 strikeouts and a 1.001 WHIP. He also finished with the second-best hit and strikeout rates of his career, 6.2 and 10.0 per nine, respectively.
For years, Verlander had made his living by pumping gas past hitters. In his Cy Young season in 2011, Verlander threw his four-seam fastball at an average velocity of 96 mph. Last season, it was down to 94, but he did manage to recover a few ticks from 2014 and 2015 when minor injuries dragged his cruising velocity down to 93.
As his body has aged, Verlander has made the necessary adjustments to his pitching style. In 2011 when he won the Cy Young, he primarily threw fastball, curve, and changeup. He now throws the slider more frequently, while ditching the changeup. The changes in approach have allowed him to maintain or even increase the number of empty swings.
Verlander will be 34 on Opening Day this season, and has nearly 2,500 innings on his arm when counting the postseason. It looked like a stretch to say that the Tigers would continue getting this type of performance until Verlander’s contract runs out in 2019, but his dominant 2016 season should quiet the doubters for at least another year.
7. Jake Arrieta, Chicago Cubs
A case could have been made for one of Arrieta’s rotation mates in Chicago, Jon Lester or Kyle Hendricks. Lester is coming off one of the best seasons of his career, finished second in the Cy Young vote, and shared the NLCS MVP. Hendricks was also a legitimate Cy Young contender, led the NL with a 2.13 ERA, and had a 1.42 ERA in five playoff starts. Of the three, however, Arrieta still has the highest upside and lengthier track record.
Arrieta did take a step back from his impossibly dominant second half of 2015, but he still strung together an 18-win season while allowing the lowest H/9 in the National League. Opponents slugged only .307 against him, and his .194 opponent’s batting average was the lowest in baseball. He started the year 9-0 in April and May with a 1.56 ERA. Dating back to the second half of 2015, Arrieta had made 26 starts, posted a 21-1 record, all while pitching to a 1.09 ERA. What’s more, he threw in two no-hitters to boot.
The incredible run of dominance Jake Arrieta enjoyed had to come to an end sooner or later, and after his 9-0 start to 2016, he finished 9-8. Many of the same control problems that plagued him in Baltimore reared their ugly head. His worst month of the year came in July, when he went 0-3 with a 4.88 ERA. Arrieta’s biggest problem is that his sinker and slider can move too much at times. The best approach for hitters is to just simply lay off and hope for the best. In 2015, his sinker and slider were balls 32.7 percent and 30.4 percent of the time, respectively. Last season, those numbers jumped to 35.2 percent and 34.5 percent. That makes all the difference, even for a pitcher with dominant stuff like Arrieta.
6. Madison Bumgarner, San Francisco Giants
Mad Bum is without a doubt the greatest postseason pitcher of this generation. His regular season numbers may not be quite as gaudy as other pitchers ranked higher on this list, but what Bumgarner has done in four separate postseasons is truly special. His dominance in the 2014 World Series may never be topped by a modern pitcher — 21 innings of one-run ball. In 36 career World Series innings, the left-hander has allowed just a single run.
In the regular season, Bumgarner has been the model of consistency. He has finished with an ERA below 3.00 in each of the past four seasons while throwing over 200 innings in each. He may never approach a sub-2.00 ERA for an entire season, but it’s hard to argue that there are many other starting pitchers in the league who give their team a better chance to win each time out. In 34 starts last season, Bumgarner allowed four runs or more only eight times, and never more than five. The Giants lost only four of those starts.
As an added bonus, Bumgarner is the best hitting pitcher in the league. He has 14 home runs in his career, and 12 over the past three seasons. Two of his blasts have come against Clayton Kershaw. There’s certainly some merit to the argument that Bumgarner’s home runs have been aided by the fact that pitchers let up when facing an opposing hurler, but he still has tremendous power. If we must continue to suffer through ugly at-bats by pitchers in the National League, at least we have Madison Bumgarner to provide some entertainment once every few weeks.
5. Corey Kluber, Cleveland Indians
Kluber emerged from relative obscurity to throw his first full big-league season at the age of 27. Since then, he has placed himself among the best pitchers in all of baseball, with the 2014 Cy Young and a finish in the top-three in the 2016 voting. Kluber has led the AL in FIP in two of the past three years.
In his first postseason, Kluber dominated. He made six starts and finished 4-1 with a 1.83 ERA. By the time Game 7 of the World Series rolled around, Kluber had thrown nearly 250 innings on the year, and was clearly gassed.
Kluber’s best pitch is his breaking ball. Some refer to it as a curveball, while the official pitch-tracking system calls it a slider. It is thrown faster than most curves or sliders, and has incredible bite. Whatever you want to call it, Kluber’s breaking ball is one of the best pitches in all of baseball. For his entire career, opponents have batted .131 against the breaking ball with only four home runs and over 400 strikeouts.
Interestingly, Kluber is one of the few pitchers in baseball who truly gets better as the season goes on. His worst month of the year is typically in April, perhaps due to the fact that the cold weather affects the grip on his breaking ball. In the second half of 2016, as the rest of the Cleveland rotation dropped like flies, Kluber went 9-1 with a 2.52 ERA.
4. Chris Sale, Boston Red Sox
At long last, Chris Sale has been freed of the Chicago White Sox, and will pitch for a contender. The move was a long time coming, especially after Sale clashed with management over the handling of the Adam LaRoche situation and then took scissors to a clubhouse full of throwback jerseys. Over the past five seasons, Sale has been one of the most durable and best pitchers in all of baseball.
Since 2012, Sale is 70-47 with a 3.04 ERA and 10.0 K/9. He has registered a WAR of 26.2 over the past five years, second in the AL, and is in the top five in the league in almost every meaningful pitching statistic. Moving to a Boston rotation that already includes two Cy Young winners should only serve to drive the ultra-competitive Sale to higher levels.
What was very impressive about Sale’s 2016 campaign was his ability to pitch to contact more frequently and give himself more opportunities to pitch deeper into games. His strikeout rate dropped from 11.8 per nine in 2015 to 9.3 last season, but Sale threw nearly 20 more innings while also throwing six complete games. He threw only one complete game in 2015. Finding ways to be more economical with his pitches will serve Sale well as he looks to continue his run of health.
None of that is to say that Sale does not have one of the most dominant arsenals in all of baseball. With his herky-jerky, cross-body delivery that looks more suited to a middle reliever, Sale has been death to left-handed batters. For his career, lefties are batting just .157 against his slider with a .204 slugging percentage and 177 strikeouts in only 377 at-bats.
3. Noah Syndergaard, New York Mets
He may have just completed his first full season in the big leagues, but Noah Syndergaard is more than deserving of a top-three ranking. Thor is completely redefining what is supposed to be possible for a starting pitcher in terms of sustained fastball velocity. The massive right-hander’s four-seamer fastball and sinker both averaged over 98 mph in 2016. He complimented his heat with a slider at 92 and a changeup at 90.
The combination of velocity and control at such a young age gives Syndergaard an exceedingly bright future. He struck out 218 in only 183.2 innings in 2016, and the Mets are being careful to bring him along slowly. Syndergaard has also already turned in strong work in the postseason, as he has 36 strikeouts in 26 playoff innings.
Syndergaard has the combination of velocity and sharp movement on his fastball and secondary pitches that Stephen Strasburg flashed when he entered the league. Unfortunately, Strasburg has never been able to string together a run of totally healthy seasons and has been forced to dial back his fastball. Syndergaard is a physical freak standing at 6-foot-6 and 240 pounds. He has the build to remain healthy. With the tragic passing of Jose Fernandez at only 24 years of age, the title of most exciting young pitcher in baseball is passed to a worthy arm in Noah Syndergaard.
2. Max Scherzer, Washington Nationals
Over the past five seasons, Max Scherzer leads all of baseball with 89 wins, is second in innings pitched, is third among starters in K/9, and second in WAR. He has led the league in at least one major pitching category in each of the past five years, including six in 2016 alone. Scherzer has thrown two no-hitters (one was a stray elbow pad away from a perfecto, while the other was a 17-strikeout gem), come close to a no-no on at least three more occasions, and turned in a 20-strikeout game.
Scherzer has completely lived up to his $210-million contract in his first two years with the Nationals. He has quieted some of the doubters over his ability to pitch deep into games by throwing close to 230 innings in each of the past two years, including five complete games. In any given start, Scherzer is a threat to throw a no-hitter, and you cannot say that about many pitchers in the league.
The only knock on Mad Max is his propensity to give up the homer. He also led the NL in home runs allowed last season with 31 and has given up 58 combined since leaving Detroit. In his 20-strikeout game, Scherzer actually surrendered two home runs. He is an extreme fly-ball pitcher, and the Nationals play in a much smaller park than the Tigers. Still, that’s splitting hairs with a pitcher who could strike out 300 in 2017 or add another no-hitter to his resume.
1. Clayton Kershaw, Los Angeles Dodgers
Clayton Kershaw is arguably the one and only pitcher in Major League Baseball who could announce his retirement today and still walk into the Hall of Fame. In a day and age where stringing together an entire season with a sub-2.00 ERA is cause for celebration, Kershaw has a 1.88 ERA over his past 816 innings. With three Cy Youngs and an MVP award, Kershaw is already in rarefied air for a pitcher, and is just 28 years old.
Kershaw made only 21 starts in 2016 due to a nagging back injury, but still led the league in shutouts. He finished fifth in the Cy Young vote despite throwing only 149 innings. Had he thrown enough innings to qualify, Kershaw’s SO/BB ratio in 2016 of 15.6 would have blown away the old record by over four points.
Next: Best Starting Pitchers in MLB History
Of all starting pitchers in MLB’s “Live Ball Era,” which is estimated to begin in 1920, Kershaw leads all starting pitchers in ERA, is second in FIP, is fifth in opponent’s batting average, leads in WHIP, and is third in WAR through his age-28 season. Simply put, Kershaw is one of the very best to ever do it on a pitcher’s mound. His name is up there with the likes of Tom Seaver, Nolan Ryan, Pedro Martinez, and a host of other Hall of Fame pitchers. Watching Clayton Kershaw on the mound in his prime is an absolute treat, and baseball fans must appreciate his special level of historic dominance