Fantasy baseball pitcher rankings, lineup advice for Friday's MLB games - ESPN

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The 2024 season has not gone especially smoothly for Toronto Blue Jays ace Kevin Gausman, who last year finished third in the American League Cy Young Award balloting and eighth among starting pitchers in fantasy points.

Gausman's spring training was thrown off track during the first week of March, after he complained of shoulder fatigue, and it took him until March 25, three days before baseball's Opening Day, before he became ready for game action. Despite his abbreviated spring, the Blue Jays included him in their season-opening rotation, slotting him in for a decent, 69-pitch outing on March 31.

Gausman's second start, this past Saturday against the New York Yankees, rekindled concerns about his health. He surrendered six runs (five earned) on four hits, two of them home runs, in 1⅓ innings' work, but most critically, his average fastball velocity (91.4 mph) represented his second-worst number in any of his 300 career appearances. Yankees hitters missed only twice on 19 swings against him.

Considering the number of injuries that have struck starting pitchers thus far — Eury Perez and Shane Bieber have succumbed to Tommy John surgery, Spencer Strider might not be far off needing a similar operation, and Framber Valdez, Nick