Collette Calls: Where Are the Wins?

All stats referenced are through games played on May 25th, 2025

The win is arguably one of the least favorite stats for fantasy managers. Nothing is more maddening than seeing Jorge Lopez with six wins and a 6.00 ERA out of the beleagured Nationals bullpen, while Jose Berrios has one win through 11 starts with a 4.22 ERA one season after he won 16 games for a 74-win Toronto team. 

We have come to expect the league will not be returning to the pre-Covid levels of starting pitching usage because the percentage of wins has hovered in the 58-60 percent range over the past five seasons, while the rate of wins going to starters was hovering around 70 percent before the pandemic reset things:

The logic tells fantasy managers to take starters on good clubs because they will be in the best position to get wins. That is certainly a solid plan, but we continue to see outliers each season. Last season, Berrios finished tied for second with 16 wins while pitching for a 74-88 club. Pablo Lopez was just behind him for an 82-80 Minnesota team, as was Shota Imanaga for an 83-79 Chicago team. Conversely, Charlie Morton had eight wins for a 89-73 Atlanta club as did Nestor Cortes for a 94-68 New York club, while Logan Gilbert bested them by one win for a 85-77 Seattle club. 

It all comes down to run support, as 1987 Nolan Ryan and 2012 Felix Hernandez will tell you. The irony of it all is I'm composing this story while watching Zack Littell throw six innings of shutout baseball against Minnesota while not receiving an ounce of run support from his team. Littell already had the 13th-worst run support in games he starts, with the Rays providing him 2.7 runs per start, which is why Littell has won just three of his eight starts despite pitching to a 3.27 ERA. However, misery does love company, and Littell isn't alone in seeking run support from his teammates. In fact, Littell is currently facing Chris Paddack, who has had even less run support than Littell has received this season. The first seven starters on the lack-of-support list all involve pitchers on sub-.500 clubs, but we also see some notable names start to appear on good clubs. Pitchers on clubs with that are at least .500 are noted with an asterisk:  

Minnesota has recently turned their season around after discussions on whether Rocco Baldelli would survive the month of May, yet Joe Ryan has won just 4 of his 9 starts despite pitching to a 2.68 ERA so far this season. His teammate, Paddack, has now won just 2 of his 11 starts this season with a 3.92 ERA, a mark that has been much better after a rough start to his season. It's a bit surprising to see Wacha alone on this list for run support with the Royals considering how their offense has underperformed this season while he has pitched to a 3.21 ERA this season. Valdez most recently threw eight shutout innings against Kansas City but has now won three of his last four starts after a stretch with six winless outings. Finally, Flaherty has the highest ERA of all the starters on winning clubs at 4.39, which is a big reason he has just two wins in 10 starts for the surprisingly great Tigers this season. 

Conversely, several players are enjoying favorable run support on both winning and losing teams this season. Players on clubs with non-losing records are once again marked with an asterisk:

If you were wondering how Ben Brown was 3-3 despite a 6.39 ERA, now you see why. He is a tantalizing mixture of skills but a .393 BABIP and 62 percent LOB% have created nearly a two-run gap in his ERA and FIP. Fried doesn't need the run support the way he is pitching, as the Yankees have won 10 of the 11 games he's started this season, and only one of those outings was what would be considered a cheap win. The Cardinals are playing surprisingly well this season, but Gray has been the only starter to thoroughly enjoy the run support, as the 7.5 runs a starter he has received is well above the 4.9 run per start the club has offered to its starters overall. Sanchez is 4-1 over 10 starts with an ERA of 3.17 while enjoying a favorable amount of run support. He has gone winless in his last three outings and has just once recorded 19 outs in a contest this season. Canning has won half of his starts since being freed from the Angels, but pitching to a 2.88 ERA while receiving 5.8 runs of support certainly helps. 

Ray has been absolutely fantastic as a starter, with seven wins in 11 starts with slightly fewer strikeouts than his pre-injury form but better ratios with a surprising amound of run support from his teammates. Baz, until his most recent outing, had a horrendous month of May. He won his final start in April with seven shutout innings, but then went 0-3 with a 9.61 ERA over his next four starts, a performance that no amount of run support would have salvaged. Hopefully his recent success against Toronto gets him back on track. Lopez appears to be hoarding the run support Paddack and Ryan aren't getting, while Luzardo has suffered some serious no-decision luck, because he should have more than  fivewins with a 2.15 ERA and the type of run support he's received to date. Finally, Olson has won just four of his nine outings despite a sub-3.00 ERA with the run support he has received, but he hasn't often pitched deep into games and has gone 1-1 over his last four starts despite the overall success of his team and his average run support. 

The league average for starting pitching run support is 4.4 runs per game with the Cubs leading the pack at 6.2 runs per start and the Pirates bringing up the rear at a meager 3.0 runs of support per contest. There are some oddities playing out at the team level. For instance, Boston has but 13 wins by starting pitchers this season despite the offense providing 4.8 runs of support per start. Texas starters have received seven more wins than Boston despite one of the worst levels of run support for their starters at 3.4 runs a game. That level of support is tied with the paltry Kansas City offense and just ahead of Colorado and Pittsburgh's meager level of support:

The Dodgers and Red Sox stand out as two teams providing above-average run support to their starters and yet are not seeing starters grab wins. Both teams have dealt with a variety of injuries to their staffs this season, but Yoshinobu Yamamoto now has six of the 14 starting pitching wins for the Dodgers, while Walker Buehler and Garrett Crochet each have four wins while the rest of the Boston staff has five in 36 starts. Teams that provide at least 4.4 runs of support this season are averaging 18.7 starting pitching wins, while the Dodgers and Red Sox are first and second in no-decisions this season. The recent loss of Alex Bregman for the Boston offense could make this even worse as the offense looks to rebuild after losing its second-best bat for "an extended period of time," according to Alex Cora. 

Run support can be a finicky thing which can quickly turn around with one outing in either direction. Ryan Pepiot had 2.8 runs of support per contest as he entered this past Sunday's game against Toronto, with a 2-5 record and a 3.99 ERA. He ended up throwing seven scoreless frames while the team scored 13 runs and boosted his run support a full run per game. Meanwhile, Crochet fell to 4-4 on the season despite striking out 11 over 6.2 innings as he allowed 2 runs in a 3-2 loss to Milwaukee. If you're looking for this season's Jose Berrios, the likes of Brady Singer and Brandon Pfaadt appear to be well-positioned on teams hovering around .500 while providing run support at the right times. Meanwhile, let's hope that the situations in Los Angeles, Boston and even Seattle level off, because the starters should have more wins than they do given the overall run support those offenses are providing this season.