Year of the Pitcher
2025 is shaping up to be the year of the pitcher. 20!!! pitchers have ERAs under 3 as of writing. Last year, only 9 pitchers could claim that at the same point of the season. With so many pitchers dominating, it’s worth checking out the hobby prospects of the league’s aces that are pitching brilliantly.
Pitchers are often overlooked in the hobby, with the occasional exception, such as Skenes. The tenuous place pitchers hold in the hobby is even more precarious, as the way modern pitchers are used makes it difficult for them to create a solid HOF case.
Let’s see if any of the 20 pitchers with ERAs under 3 have hobby potential, or if Paul Skenes will be alone as a hobby star.
Paul Skenes
Skenes gets his own category. He’s in a great position for Cy Young voting and fully living up to his potential. The only thing really holding him back is playing for the moribund Pirates, who are doing their darndest to keep him from getting wins. Regardless, Skenes is a pitching hobby phenom the likes we haven’t seen since Strasburg mania.
HOF Path
Chris Sale has cemented his place in the HOF and is now working on moving up the ranks of great modern pitchers. Kershaw, Scherzer, and Verlander are the contemporary gold standard, and Sale needs some work to get to their level. Seasons like he’s having help. I do wonder if Sale will be the last clear-cut pitching HOF candidate for quite a while.
Jacob deGrom might have something to say about that. He’s been the most dominant pitcher imaginable at times, but needs more playing time to make a push for the HOF. He’s back and pitching at a high level, even if it’s not quite as awesome as he used to be.
Vets with Hobby Love
Max Fried avoided hobby anonymity by being an ace for the Braves. The allure of Braves pitchers is still a thing in the hobby. Getting traded to the Yankees and putting together his finest season to date is a great way to keep his hobby profile growing.
Tarik Skubal’s hobby popularity is undeniable. His inserts have been selling comparably to Kershaw cards in recent releases. He looks like he might be embarking on his HOF-worthy peak of his career.
Potential New Aces
Yoshinobu Yamamoto is proving to be the ace of the most important team in MLB. That’s a great place to be. It’s worth watching how many innings he’ll wind up pitching this year.
Hunter Brown had some buzz when he was called up, but he had some growing pains before putting up a solid season last year. Solid doesn’t move the needle in the hobby. What he’s doing as a 26-year-old can. Maybe his arm will fall off tomorrow, but he’s overlooked in the hobby given his pedigree and performance.
Mackenzie Gore has a similar story to Brown, but with even more initial hype. Gore has turned into the strikeout king of the league this year as the only pitcher to average over 12 strikeouts per 9 innings.
Kris Bubic isn’t a big deal in the hobby. He was on pretty much every fantasy baseball sleeper list, and along with Cole Ragans (currently injured), gives the Royals one of the best 1-2 punches in MLB at the top of their rotation.
Garret Crochet is pitching exactly like the Red Sox hoped he would. His strikeout rate is down a bit, but he’s figured out how to be a true ace. He’s the player most likely to join Skubal as the biggest non-Skenes young pitcher in the hobby.
Joe Ryan has been a guy I’ve been waiting to break out for a couple of years. He’s been good with flashes of brilliance. He might’ve waited too long. At 29 and lacking any kind of pizzazz, Ryan will need to up his game even more to get hobby attention.
The Other Guys
The other 9 pitchers with ERAs under 3 are unlikely to make waves in the hobby. Logan Webb might be the most consistent pitcher as he’s on pace for his fourth straight year of 180 innings plus. He also has a PED suspension that seems to keep him on the fringes at best in the hobby. Zack Wheeler is the other name of note and is a very good pitcher. It takes greatness for pitchers to get noticed in the hobby, and at 35, time has all but run out for him.
Wrap Up
In the year of the pitcher, I think several pitchers are coming out of the shadow that Skenes casts over the hobby landscape. Collectors agree that the time to snap up cheap copies of these pitchers’ cards was a few months ago. Still, one can load up on nice rookies of multiple pitchers mentioned here for the price of one comparable Skenes card, so maybe there are bargains to be found.