Best Ball is largely a strategy game, but we ultimately have to identify the players who we believe are the most important chess pieces for us to utilize in a given year, or what I like to call Core Picks.

These players are the players who I am targeting the most and building my portfolio around in the 2024 MLB Best Ball season. The reasons may be slightly different for each player – draft structure, my ranking vs. ADP, positional scarcity, raw upside, or various other reasons – but these are ultimately the players that are pillars of my portfolio, specifically the pitchers.

Pitchers

Nick Pivetta, Boston Red Sox

You’ll see a bit of a theme with my pitchers. I don’t believe the best ball market is appropriately pricing some of these mid to late round pitchers, and so my general draft strateg is to wait on pitching. Pivetta is arguably the most underpriced pitcher in the player pool, despite the fact that he’s risen considerably from the opening of the contests on Underdog. The polarizing talent finally put it geother in 2023 for the Red Sox and was one of the very best pitchers in baseball. He had the 5th highest K rate of pitchers with 100 IP – behind just Strider, Glasnow, Snell and Ohtani. His xFIP was 3.55 – lower than both Snell and Ohtani.

Hunter Greene, Cincinnati Reds

Greene is certainly not the most consistent pitcher on the planet, but we don’t really care about that for Best Ball. Nothing in this game is ever THIS simple… but it’s also sort of as simple as he’s one of the very best strikeout artists in all of baseball. He’s posted a 30+% K rate in each of the last two seasons while throwing more than 100 innings and sporting an xFIP at 4 or below in each season. His K rate was 7th in all of baseball of pitchers with at least 100 innings, yet he’s drafted outside the top 100 on Underdog.

Ryan Pepiot, Tampa Bay Rays

You could say I have a thing for Rays pitchers, but it’s not just blind Rays trust with Pepiot. The former Dodgers prospect is set for a top rotation spot with the pitcher friendly Rays after being dealt for Tyler Glasnow. He posted dominant strikeout numbers across the minors from 2019-2023 and, albeit on a small sample, seemed to get his control more in check in 2023 in both AAA and the bigs. Talent + Rays + Rotation Security + Last Round Pick. Sign me up.

DL Hall, Milwaukee Brewers

As we saw with players like Kyren Williams and Puka Nacua in the 2023 NFL Best Ball season, the power of a late round pick who is not drafted in every draft breaking out to an elite is so incredibly valuable. Hall probably tops that list for me at the pitcher position. The former 1st round pick has been a bit wild over his minor league career thus far, but he has been a truly elite strikeout artist. He also seemed to come into his own last season out of the bullpen for the Orioles posting elite numbers – 28% K Rate, 6% Walk Rate, 3.11 xFIP and a 15+% swinging strike rate, while being pretty hilariously unlucky against right handed bats from a statcast perspective. He should now be given every opportunity to shine for the Brewers after being traded for Corbin Burnes, and yet he’s largely undrafted in best ball.

Honorable Mention:

Freddy Peralta, Milwaukee Brewers. Bryan Woo, Seattle Mariners. Bailey Ober, Minnesota Twins, Kyle Gibson, St. Louis Cardinals.