While cheat sheets and rankings are great, I often find it more valuable to come up with my own rankings based off of a research and place players by position in tiers. I am a big believer that balance is what wins, especially in fantasy baseball. I have already taken a look at my 1B TIERS, 2B TIERS, 3B TIERS, SS TIERS , OF TIERS, CATCHER TIERS and RELIEVERS. Now, it's time to conclude the series by looking at some starting pitchers.

TIER 1 - Johan Santana (NYM), CC Sabathia (NYY), Tim Lincecum (SF), Roy Halladay (TOR)

TIER 2 - Brandon Webb (ARI), Cole Hamels (PHI), Jake Peavy (SD), Dan Haren (ARZ), Josh Beckett (BOS), Francisco Liriano (MIN), Jon Lester (BOS), Chad Billingsley (LA), Carlos Zambrano (CHC), Felix Hernandez (SEA)

TIER 3 - Joba Chamberlain (NYY), Cliff Lee (CLE), Roy Oswalt (HOU), James Shields (TB), Matt Cain (SF), Edinson Volquez (CIN), Yovani Gallardo (MIL), Daisuke Matsuzaka (BOS), John Lackey (ANA)

TIER 4 - Javier Vazquez (ATL), Scott Kazmir (TB), Justin Verlander (DET), John Danks (CHW), Adam Wainwright (STL), Matt Garza (TB), Zack Greinke (KC), Ricky Nolasco (FLA), Ryan Dempster (CHC), Ted Lilly (CHC)

TIER 5 - Josh Johnson (FLA), Scott Baker (MIN), Derek Lowe (ATL), Chien-Ming Wang (NYY), Ervin Santana (ANA), David Price (TB), Kevin Slowey (MIN), A.J. Burnett (NYY), Max Scherzer (ARI), Jered Weaver (ANA), Chris Carpenter (STL), Rich Harden (CHC), Erik Bedard (SEA), Johnny Cueto (CIN), Hiroki Kuroda (LA)

TIER 6 - Aaron Harang (CIN), Ubaldo Jimenez (COL), Jeremy Guthrie (BAL), John Smoltz (BOS), Randy Johnson (SF), Pedro Martinez    (NYM), Clayton Kershaw  (LA), Mark Buehrle (CHW), Gil Meche (KC), Joe Saunders (ANA), Fausto Carmona (CLE), Jair Jurrjens (ATL), Joe Blanton (PHI),John Maine (NYM), Koji Uehara (BAL), Gavin Floyd (CWS), Andy Sonnanstine (TB)

TIER 7 -  Todd Wellemeyer (STL), Mike Pelfrey (NYM), Brett Myers (PHI), Oliver Perez (NYM), Bronson Arroyo (CIN), Andy Pettitte (NYY), Wandy Rodriguez (HOU), Kenshin Kawakami (ATL), Manny Parra (MIL), Armando Galarraga (DET), Anthony Reyes (CLE), Justin Duchscherer (OAK), Jesse Litsch (TOR), Jordan Zimmermann (WAS), Brad Penny (BOS)

Drafting Strategy: The depth at pitcher is amazing and is a position you can afford to wait for. Understanding your scoring format will go a long way towards weeding out productive players to draft. Wins are always the toughest to project, but innings and strikeouts are pretty easy to get a gage on.

Final Take: I go with a nice mix here. If you can get two Top Tier guys (1 and 2) and build from there. Balance your team with a nice mix of proven commodities and young arms with upside.

Fantasy Baseball fantasy advice, tier rankings, fantasy sp