What's happening with starting pitching recently? Has anyone else noticed the slow, but consistent, decline in numbers that has affected Fantasy owners? I'm not really talking about from last year to this, but in looking at the past couple decades, the shift from pitching to hitting has become more pronounced.

And I'm not just talking about steroids.

ADP for Top 30 Starters
For CBSSports.com H2H leagues
Round.Pick Player, Team
1.02 Johan Santana, NYM
1.10 Jake Peavy, SD
2.03 Josh Beckett, BOS
2.07 Brandon Webb, ARI
2.09 Justin Verlander, DET
2.12 C.C. Sabathia, CLE
3.05 Carlos Zambrano, CHC
3.10 Dan Haren, ARI
3.12 John Lackey, LAA
4.01 Erik Bedard, BAL
4.06 Aaron Harang, CIN
4.10 Scott Kazmir, TB
4.11 Cole Hamels, PHI
5.03 Roy Halladay, TOR
5.05 Daisuke Matsuzaka, BOS
5.06 Felix Hernandez, SEA
6.06 Roy Oswalt, HOU
6.10 Dontrelle Willis, DET
7.05 Fausto Carmona, CLE
7.06 * Brett Myers, PHI
7.08 Chris R. Young, SD
8.02 Francisco Liriano, MIN
8.03 Chien-Ming Wang, NYY
8.06 John Maine, NYM
8.07 Brad Penny, LAD
8.08 John Smoltz, ATL
9.05 Javier Vazquez, CHW
9.06 A.J. Burnett, TOR
9.07 Yovani Gallardo, MIL
9.09 Jered Weaver, LAA
9.11 Oliver Perez, NYM
10.01 Jeremy Bonderman, DET
10.04 Tim Lincecum, SF
10.06 Pedro Martinez, NYM
10.07 Ben Sheets, MIL
10.08 Matt Cain, SF
10.09 Jeff Francis, COL
10.10 Tim Hudson, ATL
11.06 Rich Hill, CHC
11.07 Kelvim Escobar, LAA
* Expected to pitch in the rotation
Brandon Webb led the NL with just four complete games in 2007. Do you realize that's the lowest number to lead either league -- ever? And that includes the strike-shortened 1994 season. The AL isn't much better. Roy Halladay led the AL with five complete games in 2005, and the trio of Mark Mulder, Sidney Ponson and Jake Westbrook led the AL with five complete games in 2004. As a matter of fact, in the 2000s, no player in either league completed more than nine games.

Yet in the early '80s, the Athletics starters chewed up innings at a blistering pace. All five of their starters in the rotation had at least 10 complete games, with Rick Langford leading the majors with 28 complete games! Obviously, in this age of specialization, it's doubtful that number will ever be approached again.

And this past season, we also saw a drop in the number of pitchers that were able to get through just 200 innings. Only 38 pitchers hit the 200-IP mark last year, which is the second-lowest number since 1995, the first season after the strike. One of the biggest reasons I think for the few members of the 200-IP club is that the weather in April was pretty cold, keeping a lot of pitchers from going deep into games and some even pulled up lame. The injuries either affected them early -- or later in the season.

Rick Wilton of Baseball-Injury-Report.com noted that injuries were up 14 percent in April of last season compared to previous years. There were 166 disabled list moves in April of '07, which was a sharp increase from April of 2006, when 142 players went on the DL. Pitchers usually tend to make up about 60 percent of the players placed on the DL also.

And regardless of the weather, managers realize that elbow, shoulder and oblique injuries can ravage a pitching staff, so they just aren't allowed to go as deep into games as they once did. And don't underestimate the importance of innings pitched in Fantasy, since the more they throw, the more chances they have at strikeouts and wins. Unfortunately, it also means their ERA's and WHIP's have more of an opportunity to get beat up too.

Obviously, if players aren't pitching as many innings, they're likely not picking up as many wins either. Josh Beckett is the only pitcher in the past two seasons to record 20 wins. Even in post-strike '95, Greg Maddux and Mike Mussina won 19 games apiece.

Since the stars are coming in with lesser numbers than the recent past, it's tough to recommend going after starting pitching at an early stage of any draft. Outside of Johan Santana and Jake Peavy, players that can lead you in three or four Rotisserie categories, why take a chance on a possible 16-game winner in Rounds 5-7 if you can get a 15-game winner a couple rounds later, after you've bolstered your hitting?

Pitching History 101

Strikeouts are valuable in every league, of course, but it seems the art of the strikeout seems to be slipping also. Well, maybe not the strikeout itself, but the warriors that were able to strike out 300 batters a season in the late '90s and early 2000s.

ADP for Top 40 Starters
For CBSSports.com Roto leagues
Round.Pick Player, Team
1.10 Johan Santana, NYM
2.03 Jake Peavy, SD
3.02 Josh Beckett, BOS
3.06 Brandon Webb, ARI
3.09 C.C. Sabathia, CLE
4.02 Justin Verlander, DET
4.04 Erik Bedard, BAL
5.03 Dan Haren, ARI
5.06 Cole Hamels, PHI
5.08 John Lackey, LAA
5.09 Scott Kazmir, TB
5.10 Roy Halladay, TOR
5.11 Carlos Zambrano, CHC
6.02 Aaron Harang, CIN
6.07 Felix Hernandez, SEA
6.10 Roy Oswalt, HOU
7.02 John Smoltz, ATL
7.06 Daisuke Matsuzaka, BOS
7.09 Fausto Carmona, CLE
8.03 * Brett Myers, PHI
8.10 Chris R. Young, SD
9.01 Jered Weaver, LAA
9.04 Chien-Ming Wang, NYY
9.05 Javier Vazquez, CHW
9.09 Brad Penny, LAD
10.02 Francisco Liriano, MIN
10.04 Ben Sheets, MIL
10.07 Yovani Gallardo, MIL
10.08 Matt Cain, SF
10.09 A.J. Burnett, TOR
10.11 Kelvim Escobar, LAA
11.01 Tim Lincecum, SF
11.05 John Maine, NYM
11.07 Tim Hudson, ATL
11.09 Rich Hill, CHC
11.10 James Shields, TB
12.02 Pedro Martinez, NYM
12.05 *Chad Billingsley, LAD
12.07 Dontrelle Willis, DET
13.07 Oliver Perez, NYM
* Expected to pitch in the rotation
There just aren't pitchers out there like the ones we were able to choose from in those years. They might still be in the league, but they're certainly past their prime, now that age and injury has caught up to them. Curt Schilling, Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez and Roger Clemens are not what they were from 1997-2002. Nine different times one of these pitchers threw for at least 300 strikeouts in that six-year time period. As a matter of fact, Pedro in '97 and Schilling in '02 were second in the NL in strikeouts, despite striking out more than 300 batters apiece.

In the past three seasons, the NL strikeout leader has averaged 224 strikeouts, while the AL leader averaged 241 Ks. Obviously, Santana and Peavy are the new captains in this category, both winning the title in two of the past three seasons in their leagues.

Santana now joins the Mets in the NL where he'll get to face his opposing pitcher at the plate instead of a designated hitter, so we can expect his strikeouts to climb a bit again. And Peavy won the Cy Young award after he finally stayed healthy and consistent, posting career highs in starts, wins, innings and strikeouts.

Head-to-Head vs. Rotisserie

This portion of the column is similar to the Saves column. Is there a difference between drafting starting pitchers in Head-to-Head leagues compared to Rotisserie leagues? Here are some questions (and answers) you'll want to apply to your Head-to-Head leagues.

Does your league deduct points for losses?

  • If the answer is no -- move on to the next question.
  • If the answer is yes, then you might want to consider taking lesser pitchers on better teams, rather than average pitchers on bad teams. That 10-20 point difference (swinging from a possible loss with the average pitcher on a bad team to a win with the lesser pitcher on a good team) is enough.

Does your league require you to use starting pitchers and relief pitchers, or just pitchers as a general position?

  • If you are required to start relief pitchers, and you find that scoring is heavy toward starting pitchers, then consider picking up players that will have eligibility in both spots, like Brett Myers, Chad Billingsley and Zack Greinke. They'll give you flexibility and you can take advantage when they are in two-start weeks.
  • If you only have to start pitchers in general, go to the stats page in your league, and sort pitchers by "Projections," and that will give you our rankings for starters and relievers combined.

How do I know if my league heavily favors starters or relievers?

  • Go to the stats page in your league, and sort by "All Pitchers," with 2007 totals. If you see more than five relievers in the top 20 in Fantasy points, your league heavily favors relief pitching, so grab one of the Big Three closers early on.
  • If you see two or three relievers in your top 20, consider your scoring system to be relatively favorable for starters. That means you can wait a bit on closers and build up a solid two or three starting pitchers.

Expect to see both Peavy and Santana to go in the first couple rounds of Rotisserie league drafts, but expect just 4-6 starters picked in the next two rounds before the sluggers/speed demons run thin. A group of around 10-12 pitchers will get picked up in most fifth/sixth/seventh rounds, which is a good place for you to grab at least one. You can wait until Rounds 9-11 to snatch up another starter or two, and maybe even a closer.

Numbers to shoot for

Number of 200-IP pitchers
Year 200-IP P's IP Leader
2007 38 C.C. Sabathia, 241
2006 45 Bronson Arroyo, 240.2
2005 50 Livan Hernandez, 246.1
2004 42 Livan Hernandez, 255
2003 44 Roy Halladay, 266
2002 42 Randy Johnson, 260
2001 45 Curt Schilling, 256.2
2000 37 Jon Lieber, 251
1999 43 Randy Johnson, 271.2
1998 53 Curt Schilling, 268.2
1997 42 Roger Clemens, 264
1996 47 Pat Hentgen, 265.2
1995 19 David Cone, 229.1
If you are playing in a Rotisserie league, and you want to compete in most of the pitching categories, here are some numbers to target. For wins, you'll likely need over 105 wins to win the category outright. You'll also need around 95 wins to finish in the top three. If you total fewer than 85 wins -- consider yourself in the bottom half of the standings. And if you project your team to get 50 or fewer wins -- you will likely finish last in that category.

As far as strikeouts go, 1,200 K's is a nice target to win the category, but you can also try and finish in the top-three with 1,150 strikeouts. And the top half of the owners in this category should have around 1,125 K's. Anything under 950 strikeouts likely earns you just one Rotisserie point.

In ERA, shoot for 3.90 or lower to win, 4.00 for top-three, 4.10 for top-six and stay better than 4.70 if you want to keep out of 12th.

For WHIP (walks plus hits, divided by innings pitched), the winner is usually under around 1.270. Top three owners should be under 1.290, and top-half owners are under 1.315. Owners with WHIPs worse than 1.380 are in danger of landing in last.

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