When assessing the future stats of a player, it’s imperative to consider player health and injury risk when speculating on playing time. After all, getting onto the field and being given a chance to succeed only happens if the player is healthy enough. That’s why looking at a player’s track record of health gives credence to whether someone is worth drafting. A fantasy team could have all the talent in the world, but if they’re on your Injured List or bench, they lose a ton of value.
We are moving toward draft season, and all eyes will be on the top players at each position. Knowing of any inherent risk to drafting someone can help teams in the long run. That’s why today will be a part of positional examinations of injury risk. I will be going through the Injury History of the top players at every position and making notes of their healthy or troubled pasts. Seeing trends in their health could help determine any future problems.
The players listed below will be separated into one of three categories: red light, yellow light, green light. The timeframe that will be examined will primarily be from 2021 to 2023, though looking into the distant past might also take place.
Red Light: any players listed here have an extensive and/or concerning injury history that seems likely to come into play in the future. The potential for injury outweighs their production on the field and their selection could lead to roster problems down the line. The reoccurrence of a particular injury or multiple injuries also creates the need for a red light. Fantasy owners should be wary of drafting these players because the risk for injury is high.
Yellow Light: any players listed here have had their injury problems before, but they’re not necessarily prone to injury. These players here have situations to monitor, especially during the off-season and Spring Training, but it’s not necessarily as bleak as it could be. The types of injuries could also be freakish or due to bad luck with events leading to it being out of the ordinary. Fantasy owners should be aware of the injury history, but know the possibility for health is there too.
Green Light: any players listed here have had minimal problems and their future doesn’t appear to be in any jeopardy. There is nothing from their past that would indicate an injury-prone future. While injuries could happen at any time, there are no red flags in this player’s history to suggest it will lead to another one. Fantasy owners can feel safe in drafting these players.
Things to remember:
- The players listed are in the general order of how they’re being drafted.
- The level of confidence has to do with their health and nothing to do with their abilities on the field.
Starting Pitching Injury Risk for 2024 Fantasy Baseball
Once you get done here make sure to check out the full Injury Risk Series.
1. Spencer Strider – Atlanta Braves
Strider had himself an electric season in 2023. He is regarded as the best pitcher in the game with good reason. He throws incredibly hard which could lead to a future injury, but all indications from the past are quite positive. He suffered a minor oblique injury in the fall of 2022 but has otherwise remained relatively healthy. Draft with confidence.
2. Gerrit Cole – New York Yankees
Cole has been a workhorse for the Yankees since they acquired him in 2020. Most of his injury history took place earlier in his career when he was with Pittsburgh. It was here where he dealt with elbow inflammation, a bone spur, a strained triceps muscle, and more. Since then, he’s only had to deal with minor bumps and bruises that come with pitching every fifth day. He was one of only five pitchers to throw for more than 200 innings last season. Draft with confidence.
3. Corbin Burnes – Milwaukee Brewers
Burnes has been a relatively healthy pitcher throughout the years. He’s been on the Injured List just three times in his career, and none of them have been with arm injuries. Ironically, his performance has gotten worse despite needing no time to recover from the Injured List. He did have a pectoral scare earlier this season, but it was all resolved with some rest. Draft with confidence.
4. Zack Wheeler – Philadelphia Phillies
Wheeler finished 13th in innings pitched last season, which was a welcome sign after an injury-riddled 2022. That year began with an off-season scare of shoulder soreness, followed by late-season forearm tendinitis. He threw 153.1 innings that season, which was by far his lowest in years. He came back with a vengeance in 2023, giving the Phillies that “every fifth-day” option they needed. Draft with confidence.
5. Kevin Gausman – Toronto Blue Jays
Gausman’s career has seen its share of ups and downs. While with the Orioles and Braves, he had multiple years of shoulder tendinitis, causing him to miss extended time. Since then, he’s been as steady as they come, though he missed time in 2021 due to illnesses. As a member of the Blue Jays, he has posted back-to-back 31-start seasons and remains their ace. Draft with confidence.
6. Luis Castillo – Seattle Mariners
Castillo comes to the 2024 season with a pretty clean track record. He did miss one month of the 2022 season with a sore right shoulder while playing for the Reds. Other than that, he hasn’t missed a start in years and seems like a lock to be the same consistently elite pitcher again this year. He finished last season with 197.0 innings, and only his final start lasted less than 5.0 innings. Draft with confidence.
7. Zac Gallen – Arizona Diamondbacks
Gallen has had some injury scares over the years, but has managed to pitch through them. In 2021 he suffered through a hairline stress fracture of his forearm as well as a sprained right elbow, all within the first two months of the season. He still managed to throw 121.0 innings that season, and that growth catapulted him into an elite arm the next year. There could be some workload concerns for him in 2024. Combining both regular and postseason, he threw a total of 243.2 innings last year, which is by far his highest total. Whether or not that comes into play in 2024 remains to be seen. Draft with confidence.
8. George Kirby – Seattle Mariners
Kirby has had a short career in the Majors, but all of it has been on the healthy side of things. He has pitched 220.2 innings as a Major Leaguer and is a big piece of the starting rotation for the Mariners. Draft with confidence.
9. Pablo López – Minnesota Twins
López has overcome the hurdles he faced earlier in his career by posting back-to-back healthy seasons. All of his shoulder woes have seemingly gone out of the window upon his arrival to Minnesota. Over the past two years, he’s thrown 374.0 innings and has been a consistent force for the Twins. His injury history cannot be forgotten, as his shoulder has given him problems throughout his career. That being said, fantasy owners can count on him as being an SP1. Draft with confidence.
10. Tyler Glasnow – Los Angeles Dodgers
Glasnow comes to the Dodgers with a long and complicated Injury History. He’s suffered long-term injuries on his shoulder, forearm, oblique, and his elbow over the years. Tommy John Surgery and other injuries that consumed his career have limited his usage rate over the years. He finished the 2023 season posting a career-high in innings at 120.0 over 21 starts. For context, that put him at 102nd overall in innings and tied for 101st overall in games started. Expecting him to jump up, even 20 more innings, could be a faulty expectation. There are murmurs of the Dodgers moving toward a six-man rotation, which could lead to increased health for Glasnow. Draft with attention.
11. Aaron Nola – Philadelphia Phillies
Nola has been an absolute stud from a playing time perspective. His last trip to the Injured List that wasn’t COVID-19 related happened in 2017. Since then he’s pitched three seasons with well over 200 innings thrown and has started in at least 32 games in every 162-game year. Draft with confidence.
12. Tarik Skubal – Detroit Tigers
Skubal is no stranger to surgeries. In 2016, he had Tommy John Surgery, and that cost him over a year of development. Since then, he has had one major surgery over the rest of his career that cost him significant time. After experiencing arm fatigue in the second half of the 2022 season, he missed the rest due to flexor tendon surgery. His return to the mound took longer than expected, but he finally returned 11 months later. Upon his return, he looked dominant, as he pitched a shutout in seven of his games played in 2023. While all of that sounds great, he did have somewhat of a workload limit, as he failed to throw over 100 pitches in a game all season. In fact, of his 15 games started, only three of them went longer than six innings. He’s poised to succeed in 2024, but it’s unclear if he will be limited next season. That is something to watch for in the Spring. Draft with attention.
13. Yoshinobu Yamamoto – Los Angeles Dodgers
Yamamoto comes to the Dodgers with 967.2 innings pitched over seven foreign seasons in Japan. Since the beginning of the 2021 season, he has thrown just under 200.0 innings in a season twice, while last year tossing 171.0 innings. He seems to have been a workhorse overseas, which leads some to believe he’ll be ready to do the same here. He has clauses in his contract that would prohibit him from opting out of his deal with the Dodgers if he receives Tommy John Surgery before the end of the 2029 season. This is a form of protection by the Dodgers in case he gets hurt. Yamamoto has never had Tommy John Surgery. Draft with confidence.
14. Freddy Peralta – Milwaukee Brewers
Peralta broke out in a big way during the 2021 season. He did suffer a minor shoulder injury that season but still managed to throw more than 140 innings that year. His 2022 was marred with injuries that limited him to only 78 innings of work. He first had a lat injury that cost him almost three months of playing time. Following his return, he missed two more weeks due to shoulder fatigue. Questions were raised about his durability and performance, citing him as an injury-prone pitcher. He shut down those concerns by throwing 165.2 innings in 2023, which was more than twenty higher than his career totals. Additionally, his second-half numbers were beyond elite, hopefully putting to rest any doubt fantasy owners may have had. Draft with confidence.
15. Framber Valdez – Houston Astros
Valdez has had a pretty clean track record of health in his six seasons as a Major League pitcher. He’s only been to the Injured List once and has thrown the fifth most innings of any pitcher over the past two seasons. He had some minor lower-body bumps and bruises last season, but nothing substantial enough to keep him out of action. There were some concerns that his drop in performance last season was due to his ankle and calf ailments, but he didn’t miss any time. He is someone to be counted on for innings and for performance in 2024. Draft with confidence.
16. Blake Snell – San Diego Padres
Snell was the best pitcher in baseball last season, but his Injury Risk remains quite high. Since debuting in 2018, he has been on the Injured List seven separate times and has missed 156 days due to injuries all over his body. Part of the reason why he won the Cy Young this past season was because he was able to stay healthy. Both times he has won the award, he has been able to stay on the field, throwing for 180 innings in each of those seasons. He is going to succeed in 2024, but there is a risk that he won’t be able to stay healthy, as his track record suggests. Draft with attention.
17. Logan Webb – San Francisco Giants
Webb faced some adversity earlier in his career, after struggling to pitch in 2021. A lot of pitchers had the same sorts of trouble that year after having pitched through a shortened year in 2020. The differences in workload made transitioning to a higher inning count for some, resulting in injuries. Webb was no exception to that, as he slumped with shoulder issues all season. Since then, he has bounced back with a vengeance. He has thrown 408.1 innings in that timeframe, pitting him third behind only Sandy Alcantara and the aforementioned Gerrit Cole. Whether or not that is sustainable remains to be seen, but he seems on the right track to sustainable success. He did have a minor back issue last season which is a small red flag given that he went on the Injured List for that in 2022. Still, that’s not enough to sway any level of belief that he will be pitching for a long time in 2024. Draft with confidence.
18. Max Fried – Atlanta Braves
Fried has been one of the league’s best pitchers despite his difficulties remaining healthy. Since the start of the 2021 season, he has been placed on the Injured List six times for injuries all over his body. One of them, his strained forearm, cost him 88 days last season, making 2023 almost a write-off. It’s also not inconceivable to count last season as an anomaly to the norm. From 2019 – 2022, he finished 19th in innings pitched, despite being placed on the Injured List six times. As a result, he’s one player whose future seems foggy. He’s likely to pitch a lot, but there’s a good enough chance he misses some time due to injury. Draft with attention.
19. Logan Gilbert – Seattle Mariners
Gilbert has been pitching for almost three full seasons. In that time he has thrown 495.2 innings of work and has seen his workload increase every year. He has no injuries of which to speak, nor does he have any concerns. Draft with confidence.
20. Kodai Senga – New York Mets
Senga came to the United States with some fanfare and questions. While he was a big signing for the Mets last season, his career with them got off to a rocky start. First, he had what was labeled an “iffy medical” before signing his contract. There was apparently some wear and tear seen on his arm which caused some confusion before he signed a deal. Also, he missed some time in the spring due to finger tendinitis, which caused some uncertainty, but ultimately didn’t cost him any missed time. He finished his rookie season with 166.0 innings pitched but looked better as the season wore on. Draft with confidence.
21. Grayson Rodriguez – Baltimore Orioles
Rodriguez had a breakout year in 2023. After making some adjustments in Triple-A mid-season, he came back with a vengeance and was able to lower his season-long ERA by three whole runs. Injury-wise, he suffered a Grade 2 lat strain in 2022 which caused him to miss significant time. He injured himself in late May and didn’t return until the beginning of September. It was a disappointing year for someone who was slated to debut with the Orioles. During his tenure in Baltimore this year, he remained healthy. Draft with confidence.
22. Eury Pérez – Miami Marlins
Perez came to the Marlins with a ton of potential, and for the most part, he lived up to it. His health is of no real concern moving forward. He suffered through some arm fatigue while in the Minor Leagues in 2022, but was able to return and continue along with his progression. While in Miami, his season got cut short late in September with SI joint inflammation. The team decided to shut him down after some complaints by him that there was some discomfort over his final two games prior to this one. They didn’t want him to have to change his mechanics or delivery and felt that it could have an adverse effect on his overall development. Keep in mind that his 2023 season was the longest of his Major and Minor League career. He threw a combined 128.0 innings in both Triple-A and the Majors, which is by far his highest total. While it’s fair to expect him to increase that total somewhat, he may not exceed 150 innings, which could even be a stretch there. Temper some expectations. Draft with confidence.
23. Bobby Miller – Los Angeles Dodgers
Miller overcame early-season mild shoulder soreness and broke out as a Dodger later in the year. He debuted in May and looked every bit the part of a future ace. He only battled mild knee discomfort in July, which caused one of his starts to be delayed. Otherwise, he’s had a relatively healthy career. He finished the season with 124.0 innings pitched. He will also be a part of a proposed six-man rotation, which is a plan devised to keep the pitchers of the Dodgers healthier for a more long-term approach. This will likely limit his output but could help keep him healthy. Draft with confidence.
24. Jesús Luzardo – Miami Marlins
Luzardo has had two major injuries, but only one of them was a cause for concern. His first injury, the one of non-concern, happened in 2021 when he slammed a table at home while playing a video game. He suffered a hairline fracture in his throwing hand, which resulted in almost a full month of missed playing time. One year later, he suffered a forearm strain, and the team took its time with his recovery. Luzardo was shut down from any sort of throwing for over a month before slowly elevating his recovery workload. While his transfer to the 60-day was more of a procedural move, it still shows the magnitude of the injury and their high opinions of him as a pitcher in the team’s future. This past season, he stayed relatively healthy and started 32 games for the Marlins. His innings pitched have increased every season since the pandemic, with a massive spike in playing time in 2023. His 178.2 innings pitched are significantly higher than any career total in the Major and Minor Leagues. Draft with confidence.
25. Zach Eflin – Tampa Bay Rays
Eflin broke out in 2023, partly because he was able to remain on the field. He started 31 games for the Rays, which is the highest total of his career. Ironically 2020, a year with tight illness mandates, is the only year in which Eflin has not spent time on the Injured List. Over his career, he has missed a considerable amount of time due to injuries all over his body. His right knee is the most concerning body part, as he’s had surgery to repair it, missed time due to soreness and bruises, suffered through patellofemoral and tendinopathy, and patellar tendinitis. In total, it has caused him to miss 212 days of playing time over his eight-year career. Everything worked out well for him last year, but there’s no guarantee that it will again in 2024. Draft with caution.
For more of the great fantasy baseball rankings and analysis you’ve come to expect from FantraxHQ, check out our full 2024 Fantasy Baseball Draft Kit! We’re here for you all the way up until Opening Day and then on into your championship run.