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Tomas Valincius (Photo by Eddie Kelly / ProLook Photos)

Teams scouting for the 2026 MLB Draft have been looking around and wondering where all the high-end college pitchers are. That’s because it seems like most of them are just members of the 2027 class.

While there’s still tons of uncertainty with a year and a half ahead before the 2027 draft, what seems clear already is that next year’s class will be loaded with high-end college pitchers.


It starts with Oregon State ace and potential No. 1 overall pick Dax Whitney, but there’s far more to be found beyond him.

Four more pitchers rank inside the top 10: Mississippi State lefthander Tomas Valincius, Wake Forest righthander Chris Levonas and LSU righthanders Casan Evans and William Schmidt. Each has a fastball that either touches or sits in the upper 90s to go with one—or multiple—potential plus secondaries.

Beyond that top-end group, 16 pitchers rank inside the top 30 and 25 rank inside the top 50. Overall, pitchers account for 47 spots in the top 100.

If MLB hadn’t just implemented rules to prevent it, many teams might have thought long and hard about figuring out a way to install permanent high-speed cameras at Mississippi State. That’s because the entirety of the Bulldogs’ weekend rotation has a chance to fit inside the first round between Valincius and righthanders Ryan McPherson and Duke Stone. 

That rotation is a microcosm of the pitching talent present in 2027: young pitchers with big stuff who are already taking on key roles within their teams’ pitching staffs. While the overall depth looks solid, the top of the class, in particular, could wind up being an assembly line of impact arms jockeying for position in the first and second rounds come next July.

The collective pitching line for the 16 arms inside the top 30 is shockingly good. They’ve averaged a 3.25 ERA across 371 games and 195 starts with a combined 30.7% strikeout rate and 8.7% walk rate.

Individually, 10 of those 16 pitchers have already made double-digit starts in their college careers. A half dozen are poised to join that group soon. Fourteen have a college ERA under 4.00, 10 have averaged strikeout rates north of 30% and the average K-BB% of the group is 22.4%.

And it’s not just a large group of crafty and effective arms who get results but lack stuff. There’s plenty of power, too.

Ten of the top 16 college pitchers in the 2027 class are currently averaging 94.5 mph or harder with their fastballs. Four have already hit 100 mph, and 14 of the 16 have been up to at least 96 mph.

Here’s a closer look at 2026 fastball data for each of the 16 arms ranked inside the top 30: 

RankPlayerHandSchoolAVG FBMax FB1Dax WhitneyRHPOregon State97.6100.83Tomas ValinciusLHPMississippi State94.997.34Chris LevonasRHPWake Forest97.1100.56Casan EvansRHPLSU94.7997William SchmidtRHPLSU95.598.311Landon MackRHPTennessee95.598.912Ryan McPhersonRHPMississippi State96.198.713Joshua WhritenourRHPFlorida97.8100.714Ethan LundLHPOklahoma State93.597.215Wylan MossRHPUCLA92.996.520Sam CozartRHPTexas93.797.221Jackson BarberiRHPFlorida97.510022Dylan VolantisLHPTexas91.99423Duke StoneRHPMississippi State93.596.127Aidan KingRHPFlorida92.294.428Sean JenkinsRHPEast Carolina94.598.6