When asking the question about what is an 'ace' to baseball fans you'll get a slew of requirements to be an ace pitcher. The #1 on a team, old heads like winning pitchers, others like a workhorse starter, while others will take pure stuff. For now, the term 'ace' can be debated by baseball fans far and wide, but for fantasy fans it's important to realize the dwindling requirements for a fantasy ace.
Every fantasy baseball fan is keenly aware of the 5 major categories to get you scoring. Wins, saves, K's ERA and WHIP are the standard, but when we talk about starting pitching there is an even more important stat that is often overlooked. That is innings pitched.
Common sense will tell you that the more quality innings a pitcher gets you the more the values of things like ERA and WHIP will increase. The closer with a 3.00 ERA in 60 innings is quite different than the starter with a 3.00 ERA in 180 innings. That brings us back to the question of what is a fantasy ace? The counting stats of course matter, but innings pitched has to be studied.
Last season only four starters went more than 200 innings. Logan Gilbert, Zach Wheeler, Seth Lugo and Logan Webb were all over that mark and performed like true aces. Their ERA and WHIP meant more to a season long fantasy team than someone with similar stats because of the innings logged.
Taking it a step further only 21 pitchers went over 180 innings. The workhorse starter seems like a thing of the past, but these are the arms that fantasy players should be targeting. For more context Sonny Gray and Roniel Blanco both had a terrific WHIP of 1.09, as did Seth Lugo. But Lugo's 200+ innings will be much more impactful in the WHIP category to your team instead of the 166 innings that Gray put up for example. Another example is Hunter Greene had a great 2.75 ERA but only pitched 150 innings, while I'd rather take Bryce Miller and his 2.94 ERA with 180 innings.
This isn't to say that innings pitched is everything. There are plenty of players who logged a good number of innings but weren't as productive as someone with less, but if you are torn between two players always look at innings pitched. We are in the days of the dwindling aces in the sport, but that doesn't mean you can't find the edge for those fading workhorses.