Fantasy Baseball Week 27 Preview: Two-start pitcher rankings feature Kevin Gausman, Robbie Ray
In the final week of the regular season, you have to take any two-start possibility with an enormous grain of salt
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What, no italics? That's right, I'm abandoning the usual boilerplate intro for this final edition of the two-start pitcher rankings to issue a grave warning ...
Don't count on any of these guys actually making two starts.
They appear to be in line to -- and some indeed will -- but the second start would come on the final day of the season. With no tomorrow, a team can throw caution to the wind and pretty much use whomever it wants. I'm not saying it'll start someone on short rest, but a bullpen game or a spot starter? Why not?
And actually, I think the pitchers most in danger of losing their second start are the ones on the teams with a tomorrow -- i.e., the ones resetting their rotation for the playoffs. If they've already secured their spot prior to the final day of the season and one of their top hurlers is scheduled to go, they'll almost assuredly opt for someone else.
To reiterate, you should be skeptical of any pitcher listed here actually making two starts, but especially Zack Wheeler, Max Fried and Kevin Gausman. Maybe Cristian Javier, Nick Martinez and Robbie Ray as well. You're probably going to ask about Payton Tolle because you're likely to see two baseball indicators next to his name on your lineup page, signaling two starts, but I'm so confident he won't actually make that second start that I've left him out of these rankings altogether. Of course, you'll probably still want to use him with one start because he's that good.
That should the litmus test. If you wouldn't be comfortable getting just one start from any of these pitchers, you're better off not using him at all. For now, though, here's how the two-start pitcher slate stacks up for Fantasy Week 27 (Sept. 21-27). All information is up to date as of Sunday evening.
Must-start, all formats
| 1 | Z. Wheeler SP PHI Zack Wheeler SP PHI | vs | vs |
| 2 | P. Messick SP CLE Parker Messick SP CLE | @ | @ |
| 3 | L. Gilbert SP SEA Logan Gilbert SP SEA | vs | vs |
| 4 | vs | vs | |
| 5 | J. Jones SP PIT Jared Jones SP PIT | vs | @ |
Advisable in most cases
| 6 | C. Javier SP HOU Cristian Javier SP HOU | @ | @ |
| 7 | K. Gausman SP CHC Kevin Gausman SP CHC | vs | @ |
| 8 | N. Martinez SP TB Nick Martinez SP TB | @ | @ |
Better left for points leagues
| 9 | B. Ober SP MIN Bailey Ober SP MIN | @ | vs |
| 10 | Y. Kikuchi SP LAA Yusei Kikuchi SP LAA | @ | @ |
| 11 | A. Pallante SP STL Andre Pallante SP STL | @ | @ |
| 12 | M. Soroka SP ARI Mike Soroka SP ARI | @ | @ |
| 13 | R. Ray SP SD Robbie Ray SP SD | @ | vs |
| 14 | vs | @ |
No thanks
| 15 | S. Manaea SP NYM Sean Manaea SP NYM | @ | @ |
| 16 | M. Scherzer SP TOR Max Scherzer SP TOR | @ | vs |
| 17 | D. Lynch IV RP KC Daniel Lynch IV RP KC | vs | vs |
| 18 | A. Kay SP CHW Anthony Kay SP CHW | @ | vs |
| 19 | M. Gore SP TEX MacKenzie Gore SP TEX | vs | @ |
| 20 | J. Kent SP WAS Jackson Kent SP WAS | @ | vs |
| 21 | B. Tidwell SP SF Blade Tidwell SP SF | vs | vs |
| 22 | J. Ritchie SP ATL JR Ritchie SP ATL | vs | @ |
| 23 | K. Freeland SP COL Kyle Freeland SP COL | vs | @ |
| 24 | B. Williamson SP CIN Brandon Williamson SP CIN | @ | @ |
| 25 | B. Basso RP ATH Brady Basso RP ATH | vs | vs |
| 26 | J. Junk SP MIA Janson Junk SP MIA | @ | vs |
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