Fantasy baseball rankings: Misiorowski, Miller, risers

Almost every week, Scott White will highlight some of the most notable changes to his rankings from the rest of the season. You go find the said ranking here and we invite you to add them to your favorites if you have not already done so. There is no better resource for assessing player value throughout the season.

Somehow, the Brewers still have the pitching power.

Give up your ace in a trade? It’s very good. They have a new, even better one in Jacob Misiorowski. Lose your No. 2 starter to injury? It’s not serious. Kyle Harrison filled that void and more. Each of these two has an ERA below 2.00 and a K/9 rate above 11.5. They’ve been as good as anyone could have hoped, and they’re both only 24 years old.

They are also progressing in my ranking

Of course, they’ve done it before, but this latest advancement is the biggest yet. I admit my initial skepticism of both. Misiorowski, as good as he is, has struggled to control him throughout his minor league career, and that same flaw threw his rookie season sideways in the second half of last year. However, he is now down to 2.8 BB/9 and has thrown at least six innings in four of his last five starts, no longer stifled by his own ineffectiveness. I have him in my top 10 as a starting pitcher – ahead of even Nolan McLean, another second-year pitcher whose ace traits showed up just a little earlier. Yes, I am now ready to say that Misiorowski is even better.

What about Harrison? He was once a top prospect who regularly posted double-digit K/9 rates, as he does today. However, previously this had only happened in the minors, making his lack of secondary arsenal a deciding factor in the majors. Look, it’s not just me who abandoned him. The Giants launched him in the Rafael Devers deal last year, and the Red Sox unloaded him in the Caleb Durbin trade this offseason. However, leave it to the Brewers to unlock this latent potential. If anything, Harrison has leaned even more into his fastball this year, and with a slightly raised arm angle, his breath rate is 32.2 percent, making him sixth best by that measure among starting pitchers. The top five (Misiorowski, Cam Schlittler, Mick Abel, Zack Wheeler and Michael King) were pretty spectacular in their own right.

Harrison is 34th in my starting pitcher rankings, ahead of other 2026 breakouts like Parker Messick and Jose Soriano. When in doubt, I go with the better bat.

Here are some of the other highlights from my latest rankings sweep:

• Bryce Miller’s progression in the rankings is probably the most exploitable for Fantasy purposes. He moved up about 30 spots, from 85 to 57, after a dominant effort against the White Sox in which he returned to his roots, wowing hitters with his fastball. This pitch is up 2 mph from two years ago, when he had a 2.94 ERA and 0.98 WHIP. For some perspective, his new rankings place him firmly on the must-have list, ahead of Spencer Arrighetti, Max Meyer, Bryce Elder and Davis Martin.
• Cristopher Sanchez edged out Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Garrett Crochet to claim third place in my starting pitcher rankings. Three straight scoreless outings of more than seven innings, with 30 strikeouts between them, will achieve that. He remains as good a strike thrower and ground ball generator as possible, and the missing bats just keep getting better.
• Tarik Skubal slipped to 50th in my rankings upon the first report that he needed surgery to remove a loose body in his elbow, which seemed pretty high to me, actually, for an injury of this severity. But then he learned he had a new version of the procedure that uses “NanoNeedle” technology to create a smaller incision. He’s already back in bullpen sessions and could return in a week or two, so he’s moving back to #10.
• Zack Wheeler is another pitcher who proved my concerns were overblown. Thoracic outlet surgery is often accompanied by a drop in velocity, and we saw signs of that during his minor league rehab assignment. The decline was much less than initially expected, however, and the fastball played as well as it ever has. I conservatively rank him 20th now, but he may only be an ace.
• Gerrit Cole is close to returning from his own, more conventional Tommy John procedure, and although he has more to prove than Wheeler, I went ahead and moved him up to 28th as the starting pitcher. That’s just ahead of Gavin Williams and Spencer Strider, who I think are good but have their own reasons to be skeptical. Maybe this will prove too aggressive, but Cole’s latest rehab start has been excellent, seeing him average 97 mph on his fastball.
• Jared Jones is close to returning from elbow ligament surgery (the lesser internal bracing procedure) and is showing similar signs of dominance during his rehab assignment, hitting triple digits with his fastball. He probably still has a few rounds left and sure, he wasn’t as established as Cole was at the time of his injury, which is why I rank him lower. Still, 67th places it firmly on the must-watch list.
• If you’re one of the many people wondering why Payton Tolle isn’t listed as a starting pitcher, well, he is now, having finally made enough starts to qualify. I also rank him pretty aggressively, at 44th, between Emmet Sheehan and Shane McClanahan.
• Other starting pitchers include Michael King (32 to 23) and Nathan Eovaldi (45 to 33). At the bottom are Walbert Urena, JT Ginn and Zebby Matthews, all of whom have climbed into the top 100.
• At relief pitcher, Andres Munoz has slipped behind Aroldis Chapman, Jhoan Duran and Raisel Iglesias, which is less about him and more about what those three are doing. His save rate is bound to improve, but the other three are close enough to his advantage that I have no reason to insist on keeping Munoz in the lead.
• Devin Williams was barely hanging on to his job when he allowed eight runs in four appearances in April, but since then he’s pitched 8 2/3 scoreless innings while allowing just one hit and striking out 11. He’s caused enough stress over the past two seasons that I can’t bring him back into the elite just yet, but I can at least put him ahead of Riley O’Brien and David Bednar, who have had their own struggles recently.
• It’s time to stop blindly believing that better days are ahead for Luke Keaschall, whose already suspect exit velocities have declined further this year. His speed and plate discipline will allow him to start at second base, but he’s not as valuable as Xavier Edwards or even Travis Bazzana, who is currently producing and may be no less of a base stealer and on-base threat.
• Colt Emerson lands at 22nd among shortstops in his debut in the rankings, ahead of injury cases like Trevor Story and Jacob Wilson but behind proven cases like Dansby Swanson and Willy Adames. It’s a tough position for Fantasy to get into, and for all of Emerson’s upside, I doubt he’s a fully realized player yet.
• Some of the biggest climbers in the outfield ranks include Spencer Steer (61 to 48), Carson Benge (70 to 49) and Jake Bauers (75 to 56), and if you’ve seen their numbers recently, you’ll understand why. Steer and Bauers are also eligible for first base, of course, but the climb there is tougher. Ultimately, Steer and Benge are back in the usable range, even for three-outfielder leagues. Bauers faces the added obstacle of inconsistent playing time brought on by Andrew Vaughn’s strong performance.