Without looking, could you tell us how many starting pitchers eclipsed the 200 inning plateau in 2019? The answer we’re looking for is 15, which is actually two more than it was in 2018. With that being considered, unless you are drafting the select handful of elite guys, why would you waste your time reaching on starting pitching? As you’ll learn, waiting on starters has it benefits and you could build a damn good rotation if you do.

In standard leagues across the industry, you have nine spots available to fill with pitchers. Obviously, we’re not going to fill them with all starters because we’d lose out in the holds and saves categories -- plus there aren’t that many starters in baseball for us to do such a thing. But the fact that we have so many available slots provides us with a lot of opportunities. Within the first couple of rounds, you’ll be able to pick up on some trends with the way pitchers are coming off of the board. It’s imperative you capitalize on at least one top arm early and go from there. By grabbing a top arm off of the board early, you’ve solidified the top of your staff and can take the rest of your rotation in plenty of directions. There are only eight pitchers currently being taken within the top 30 in standard 5x5 roto drafts according to Fantrax’s ADP in mock drafts this season. That’s actually up one from last year, but it doesn’t move the needle to make us, all of a sudden, take starters earlier than normal.

Once all of the top dogs have been taken and it’s our turn to draft, where do we go and how do we figure out which arms to take? Well, there are a few things we should definitely factor into our decision making. We need to examine all things from ERA’s, WHIP’s, K/9, amongst other stats from years past, to ballpark factors, to average draft position trends, etc. You get the point. What that does for us is it obviously allows us to load up on other positions. Stating the obvious? Sure, but it needs to be reiterated so draft strategies can be tweaked based on the research and time put into everything headed into draft night.

Let’s get into some names that can you start your rotation with if you haven’t drafted in the first few rounds.

Only one of the players above hit 200 innings pitched last year, but look at the potential we have here. We had two of them -- Severino and Glasnow -- suffer through injury-riddled seasons respectively and Paddack was on an innings limit, but you can’t deny the ability all three posses. Ability that could end up anchoring fantasy staffs with increased innings limit and full bill of health.

In Severino’s case, he threw 190-plus innings in back-to-back seasons prior to ‘19, so it’s not like we haven’t seen a large enough sample size to trust. Not only that, having Gerrit Cole take the “Ace” tag off of his back is a burden Severino likely enjoys having lifted. Glasnow was having a MONSTER season prior to his injury pitching to a 1.78 ERA with an 11.3 K/9 across 12 starts. Glasnow did have a 2.94 xFIP in ‘19, so we could be talking about some regression but he bolstered a 12-percent swinging strike percentage, which would have put him in a 21st place tie across all of major league baseball throughout an entire seasons span. Paddack himself had a strong 26.9-percent K-rate and gets to pitch in San Diego, which is a pitcher's haven.

In terms of Lucas Giolito , his career has been a mixed bag, but his breakout happened this past year and it happened QUICK. There are obviously still those that don’t believe in him completely and that’s why he’s being drafted as the 17th pitcher off of the board right now, but you must’ve missed some of the numbers he put up. His 15-percent SwStr rate slotted him in at sixth in the league, he was fourth in K-rate (32.3-percent) and 12th in WHIP (1.07).

Berrios, who made it to this list last year, was the one player on this list above who did surpass 200 innings. Berrios definitely had a down year putting up an xFIP and SIERA over four, but he did win 14 games and with the improved Twins offense, he’ll legitimately have a chance at 20 wins this season. He did strike out 195 batters for a second consecutive season and based on the stuff he has, we could be talking about a pitcher that approaches 250 K’s by year's end.

How about we move a little further south where ironically the weather is a wee bit colder, but the pitchers at this tier could warm up your rotation quite well. Let’s look at some guys being drafted in beyond the 10th round in 10-team leagues.

This tier above had a bunch of breakouts and potential for a couple more in Wheeler and Montas in 2020. Montas was obviously impacted by his suspension, but he was a 9-2 with a 2.63 ERA in 16 starts before it. He also upped his K-rate by 11-percent from 2018-to-’19, which is a very rare feat. Gray and Lynn were undeniably great, but they both pitch in hitting paradises, so they’re definitely going to be a little riskier than the likes of Woodruff and Wheeler.

There are gems at each tier, we just have to look for them. We’re not going to wait this long to draft our entire staff, but you could find a diamond in the rough that ends up heading your staff by year's end. Here are some guys currently being drafted in the 200’s this year we should take a look at;

It’s very hard to envision a world where we aren’t taking chances when we get down into the latter stages of our drafts. It’s not even so much taking chances but it’s buying into potential like Michael Kopech and Brendan McKay both have. Kopech has been deemed fully healthy and 100-percent ready for Spring Training and McKay continues to not only work on his craft on the mound, but in the batter's box as well. Kopech features a fastball that consistently is touching 100 MPH while McKay’s fastball/12-6 curveball combination could be one of the more lethal one-two punches that we see in the game faster than we realize.

Another guy, like Kopech, returning from injury is Lance McCullers. With the departure of Gerrit Cole , McCullers is likely going to slot in as the number three guy on this staff. He’s never been able to pitch an entire season, as 22 starts has been his limit, but McCullers is a guy with nasty stuff as evident by his career 10.1 K/9. He doesn’t give up a lot of hard contact (29.1-percent for his career) and his peripheral numbers have always been excellent (3.31 xFIP and 3.57 SIERA). If he can stay healthy, this is a guy that could start as our SP5 and become one of our staff’s best pitchers.

With all of that in mind, we should also be keeping a close eye on how rotations shape out as the spring progresses. There are plenty of teams with six, seven and possibly eight guys that are vying for rotation spots, but won’t make the original. There are a lot of different approaches and routes you can take with your staff, but having depth is crucial. Even if you are someone who enjoys taking the streaming approach, having a solid foundation that you built in the draft allows you the safety and stability to take more risks when adding a player off the waiver wire. Make sure you are doing your due diligence on pitchers being taken later in drafts and do your best to find potential and value. In an era of starters going fewer and fewer innings, this approach gives your fantasy team the greatest upside.