Every winter, the shiniest free agents on the market capture the attention of baseball fans everywhere. “Ooh, could you imagine Kyle Tucker in my team’s colors?” That’s a fun conversation regardless of which team you root for. But most teams aren’t going to sign Kyle Tucker. Most teams aren’t going to sign a top 10 free agent, period. Indeed, come June and July, there’s a good chance that the free agent signing you’re going to either laud or rue will involve some reliever you’d never heard of six months prior. So let’s meet a batch of pitchers who are going to make fans remember their name, one way or another, in 2026: Hoby Milner, Mark Leiter Jr., and Colin Holderman.

I used to think of Hoby Milner as one of the unending wave of Brewers who looked unbeatable in navy and gold and unspectacular elsewhere, but as it turns out, that was unfair to him. He departed the upper Midwest for the first time since 2020 last winter, signing a $3 million deal with the Texas Rangers after Milwaukee non-tendered him. Far from crashing out, though, he spun another solid season, his fourth in a row, while handling 70.1 innings of the highest-leverage work of his career. He finished the season with a 3.84 ERA and a 3.39 FIP, pretty much a dead ringer for his career numbers.

Why, then, is his deal with the Chicago Cubs for just one year and $3.75 million? It’s because he’s an extreme lefty specialist, and that skill set generally comes with a limited market. Milner isn’t a traditional late-inning reliever, a matchup-proof flamethrower. He has enormous platoon splits, triple the league average for lefty pitchers over a fairly substantial sample. It’s for exactly the reason you’d expect: Milner throws sidearm and with little velocity, relying on a sweeper that he throws nearly half the time against lefties to tie them into knots. Read the rest of this entry »

For the 22nd consecutive season, the ZiPS projection system is unleashing a full set of prognostications. For more information on the ZiPS projections, please consult this year’s introduction, as well as MLB’s glossary entry. The team order is selected by lot, and the next team up is the Minnesota Twins.

Batters

The Minnesota Twins are in a weird place. They looked to be legitimate AL Central contenders when this year began, but for the second straight year, they started slowly and dug themselves a pretty good hole. Just like in 2024, the Twins then got hot, surged to a bit over .500, and looked to right the ship somewhat in May and early June. But this year, after six weeks of lousy play knocked them out for good, they traded away Carlos Correa, and half of their bullpen, including Jhoan Duran and Griffin Jax, slashing payroll and appearing to set off a full rebuilding process. The initial buzz was that Pablo López and Joe Ryan would be looking for new homes this offseason, but they’ve stayed put so far, and the Twins are at least publicly saying they plan to build around the players they didn’t trade away. And it sort of makes sense, though I’m not sure if the Twins see it the same way I do.

The lineup looks to me — and ZiPS — as decidedly below average, but it should be noted that ZiPS is considerably less bullish about Brooks Lee at shortstop and the London Symphony Orchestra-sized cast in left field, seeing both of these positions as real problems. That puts me into the camp of having really mixed feelings about the Correa trade. One can see why a team that clearly didn’t want to run a high payroll might be uneasy spending that much money on Correa, who had one abbreviated awesome season and two underwhelming ones in Minnesota. But at the same time, Correa represented at least potential star performance at shortstop. ZiPS is a big fan of Kaelen Culpepper, who I like to imagine is the son of former Vikings quarterback Daunte Culpepper, but I’m not sure whether the Twins agree with ZiPS and plan on promoting him aggressively, or if they are simply happy to roll with Lee at shortstop. ZiPS also hopes that Emmanuel Rodriguez is healthy and cleans out left field quickly, though it’s still on the fence about the future of Walker Jenkins.

Byron Buxton remains, of course, the closest thing to a star on the team, but there’s always going to be the question of his health that limits the realistic expectation of his playing time. It’s encouraging that he had the most plate appearances of his major league career in 2025, but he’s also creeping into his mid-30s, when players become less durable. I remember being 32, also, and that was about the time where the aches and pains that I assumed would just magically go away in a week just… didn’t.

ZiPS is fine with Luke Keaschall at second, and sees Royce Lewis, Matt Wallner, and Ryan Jeffers as the serviceable middle class of the lineup. But in addition to the poor projections at shortstop and in left, the DH ones are unimpressive, and ZiPS sees very little merit in the Josh Bell signing. Overall, I’m not sure the Twins really have the lineup to be anything but fringe AL Central contenders. While they’ve talked about building around their remaining talent, that also doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll spend that much to work on their current holes rather than trying to develop in-house options over the next two or three years.

Pitchers

Keeping Ryan and López, if that’s what the Twins actually plan to do, is a pretty big deal. With those two at the top, Minnesota would have a legitimate playoff-caliber rotation. Bailey Ober’s history is better than his 2025 performance, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to see him as a fine mid-rotation starter, and ZiPS has always been stanning for Zebby Matthews. Simeon Woods Richardson, Taj Bradley, and Mick Abel all get highly useful projections from ZiPS, and the computer really likes the organization’s minor league depth.

Meanwhile, Minnesota’s bullpen is interesting. Losing Duran and Jax really crossed out the top tier of the bullpen, but ZiPS still sees the remaining relievers as far more than merely viable. Cole Sands, Kody Funderburk, and Justin Topa all project as solid B-minus relievers, and ZiPS expects the Twins’ tradition of cobbling together a lot of their random Triple-A arms into real bullpen options to continue in 2026. Pierson Ohl, Connor Prielipp, David Festa, Andrew Morris, and Eric Orze all have projections just a shade less sunny than the first three pitchers mentioned at the top of the paragraph.

The easiest thing for people to do is set this past season as a baseline and understand that this team isn’t going to be much better in 2026. But using last season’s record as a baseline is generally a poor idea, as there’s a good argument that a lot of the 2025 Twins underperformed their actual ability. It’s the same kind of shortcut reasoning that caused people to underrate the Blue Jays going into this season, assuming that the Jays had to build up from their actual 74-win total in 2024 rather than from something closer to 81-83 wins, which was about Toronto’s true talent level. The 2025 Twins were better than a 70-92 team, but they do have some problems with their offense that they may or may not address between now and next season. If the season started today, the Twins look like a roughly .500 team, with their expected win total somewhere in the 78-84 range, but they’re close enough to good that if they were to hit their upside scenario, they could be an interesting contender. How much the Twins end up pushing that upside scenario, rather than simply deciding not to make the team worse, is something I just don’t know yet.

Ballpark graphic courtesy Eephus League. Depth charts constructed by way of those listed here. Size of player names is very roughly proportional to Depth Chart playing time. The final team projections may differ considerably from our Depth Chart playing time.

Players are listed with their most recent teams wherever possible. This includes players who are unsigned or have retired, players who will miss 2026 due to injury, and players who were released in 2025. So yes, if you see Joe Schmoe, who quit baseball back in August to form a Ambient Math-Rock Trip-Hop Yacht Metal band that only performs in abandoned malls, he’s still listed here intentionally. ZiPS is assuming a league with an ERA of 4.16.

Hitters are ranked by zWAR, which is to say, WAR values as calculated by me, Dan Szymborski, whose surname is spelled with a z. WAR values might differ slightly from those that appear in the full release of ZiPS. Finally, I will advise anyone against — and might karate chop anyone guilty of — merely adding up WAR totals on a depth chart to produce projected team WAR. It is important to remember that ZiPS is agnostic about playing time, and has no information about, for example, how quickly a team will call up a prospect or what veteran has fallen into disfavor.

As always, incorrect projections are either caused by misinformation, a non-pragmatic reality, or by the skillful sabotage of our friend and former editor. You can, however, still get mad at me on Twitter or on Bluesky. This last is, however, not an actual requirement.

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about a smattering of transactions, featuring (among others) Jorge Polanco, Tyler Rogers, Kenley Jansen, Isaac Collins, Angel Zerpa, Merrill Kelly, Josh Bell, and Adolis García. Then (49:03) they talk about MLB’s move to regulate and standardize the use of in-game technology across the minor leagues, baseball content (sans spoilers!) in new Netflix films Wake Up Dead Man and A House of Dynamite (1:04:50), and MLB players who could come out of retirement after long layoffs, à la Colts QB Philip Rivers (1:15:20).

Audio intro: Jonathan Crymes, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio outro: Dave Armstrong and Mike Murray, “Effectively Wild Theme”

Link to FG post on Polanco
Link to Petriello on Polanco
Link to FG post on Rogers
Link to team RP projections
Link to FG post on Brewers/Royals trade
Link to 2025 team OF stats
Link to FG post on Kelly
Link to FG post on Kenley
Link to R-JAWS leaders
Link to Ben on the Lester trade
Link to MLBTR on Bell
Link to Trueblood on Bell
Link to MLBTR on García
Link to new MLB regulations
Link to 2023 report on team spending
Link to report on Monfort’s spending
Link to EW Episode 1489
Link to EW Episode 1490
Link to Ben on Elementary
Link to baseball in Knives Out
Link to blog about baseball in WUDM
Link to Reddit on baseball in WUDM
Link 2 to Reddit on baseball in WUDM
Link to Lindor references
Link to Vonn’s win
Link to Rivers post in FB group
Link to Rivers game story
Link to Seahawks tweet
Link to Gainwell wiki
Link to EW Episode 1928

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The Rangers had just 35 players on their 40-man roster at the end of the Winter Meetings, and they did their best to rectify the situation on Friday, signing catcher Danny Jansen to a two-year deal and relievers Alexis Díaz and Tyler Alexander to one-year deals. The three moves have not yet been officially announced by the club, but with the agreements, the roster is starting to look not just fuller, but much more settled. These moves may look underwhelming on the surface, but Jansen fills the team’s biggest hole, and the relievers give the Rangers the kind of upside play they’ll need to find their way back into the playoff picture in 2026.

We’ll start with Jansen, who has agreed to a two-year, $14.5 million contract, according to Robert Murray of FanSided. He is the youngest of the three catchers who made our Top 50 Free Agents list, slotting in at 38th between J.T. Realmuto (30th) and Victor Caratini (39th). Jansen beat Ben Clemens’ estimated one year and $9 million contract, and the Rangers got an extra year at a lower AAV. You may be inclined to chalk that up the relative weakness of the catcher market, but keep in mind that last year, Jansen was the only catcher to make the top 50, and the Rays gave him one year and $8.5 million. Read the rest of this entry »

Like Travis Henderson in 1984’s Paris, Texas, Merrill Kelly left his home, wandered across the desert, and ultimately realized he needed to head back where he came from. On Sunday morning, Ken Rosenthal reported that Kelly was finalizing a two-year, $40 million contract to return to the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Kelly is as Arizona as a cactus in a backyard pool. (Meg tells me they typically aren’t actually in the pool, but you know what I mean.) He went to high school in Scottsdale, a couple dozen miles northeast of Chase Field. After a stint at Yavapai Community College, he transferred to Arizona State to finish up his college career. Drafted by the Rays, Kelly shuttled off to Korea for four years in his 20s before returning to make his MLB debut for the Diamondbacks in 2019. He has spent his entire major league career in Arizona, save for a two month sojourn to Texas following a midseason trade at the 2025 deadline. Perhaps scandalized by Arlington’s complete lack of any public transit — not even a single bus line! — he kept his time with the Rangers short. In Phoenix, he’ll return as the presumptive ace at the unlikely age of 37 and with the unlikely fastball velocity of 91.8 mph.

There will be analysis of Kelly’s game to come, but his appeal is easily summarized: The guy can just pitch. Yes, his fastball sits about three ticks slower than the average right-handed pitcher. And sure, his stuff metrics are nothing to write home about. But even with these clear limitations, Kelly succeeds because he does two extremely important things: He locates the ball, and he makes it impossible for hitters to guess which pitch is coming. Read the rest of this entry »

The remaking of the Mets continues apace. After losing fan favorites Edwin Díaz and Pete Alonso to other teams in free agency last week, the Mets took a step towards replacing the latter by signing switch-hitting infielder Jorge Polanco to a two-year, $40 million deal on Saturday. Though he has almost no experience at first base, the Mets believe he can learn the position well enough for it to be his primary position.

The 32-year-old Polanco probably isn’t the first player anyone thought of as an Alonso replacement, particularly given the bigger-ticket free agents out there and the Mets’ spending power, but he’s coming off a strong season at the plate (.265/.326/.495/, 132 wRC+ with 26 homers) for the Mariners as well as a memorable October. Though he hit just .208/.269/.417 (95 wRC+) in 52 plate appearances during the postseason, his two homers off the Tigers’ Tarik Skubal powered Seattle to a 3-2 win in Game 2 of the Division Series, and his bases-loaded single off Tommy Kahnle in the 15th inning of Game 5 gave the team its first postseason series victory in 24 years. In the ALCS opener against the Blue Jays, he drove in the Mariners’ last two runs with RBI singles in their 3-1 win, then hit a three-run homer off Louis Varland that gave Seattle the lead for good in Game 2. Alas, he went just 2-for-17 the rest of the way as the Mariners fell to the Blue Jays in seven games.

Polanco, who spent the past two seasons with the Mariners and before that parts of 10 seasons with the Twins, has played mainly second base and shortstop during his major league career, though he hasn’t played the latter position since 2022, and the defensive metrics attest that it’s not a good idea anymore. Even at second base, his metrics have descended into the red, to the point that he was primarily a designated hitter last season following an October 2024 surgery to repair his left patellar tendon. He accumulated -2 DRS and -3 FRV in just 287.1 innings at second in 2024, and -1 DRS and -8 FRV in 925.1 innings there the year before. Read the rest of this entry »

The Royals had themselves a productive weekend. The kind where you re-organize the garage and get your meal prep done for the week before the Sunday Scaries set in. On Friday, news broke that the team was finalizing a deal to extend third baseman Maikel Garcia. The contract spans five years, including all four of Garcia’s arbitration-eligible seasons, with a guaranteed value of $57.5 million that could reach $85 million with options and escalators. He will make $4 million in 2026, $7 million in 2027, $10 million in 2028, $13 million in 2029, and $19 million in 2030, and the team holds a $21 million club option for 2031, with a $3.2 million buyout. Then, following the news of the Garcia signing, ESPN’s Jeff Passan reported on Saturday that the Brewers were sending outfielder Isaac Collins and right-handed reliever Nick Mears to the Royals in exchange for left-handed reliever Angel Zerpa. We’ll get into a more detailed discussion of both moves in a minute, but first let’s put this in the larger context of the Royals as an organization.

A lot of sitcoms have that one oddball character that doesn’t quite fit with the rest of the cast. The person that requires viewers to suspend their disbelief, because in real life, there’s no way the other main characters would associate with this weirdo. Your Phoebes, your Kramers, your Kimmy Gibblers, etc. These characters are a part of the main cast or have regularly recurring roles, and though they frequently find themselves integrated into the show’s primary conflicts, they’re typically situated off to the side doing their own thing. Writers insist on including these characters because they provide interesting narrative texture to group dynamics. In real life, we tend to gravitate toward like-minded people with common interests, which is great for forming meaningful connections but makes for boring TV.

Fortunately, MLB teams behave more like TV characters than real life besties, which makes for better entertainment. And with 30 teams, the league doesn’t limit itself to just one Phoebe. Several squads are singing about fetid felines and boycotting Pottery Barn, and among them we have the Royals. Kansas City has never seemed tempted to jump on the latest trends in roster construction or follow the crowd as it attempts to implement whatever the “new Moneyball” is at any given point in time. No, the Royals tend to stay true to themselves, even if that means zigging while everyone else zags or using unorthodox tactics to make sure everyone in the organization stays focused on baseball. Read the rest of this entry »

The following article is part of Jay Jaffe’s ongoing look at the candidates on the BBWAA 2026 Hall of Fame ballot. For a detailed introduction to this year’s ballot, and other candidates in the series, use the tool above; an introduction to JAWS can be found here. For a tentative schedule and a chance to fill out a Hall of Fame ballot for our crowdsourcing project, see here. All WAR figures refer to the Baseball Reference version unless otherwise indicated.

David Wright is the greatest position player in Mets history, a face-of-the-franchise player who holds the team leads in plate appearances, hits, runs, RBI, total bases, walks, and WAR. A first-round pick out of high school in 2001, the Virginia native spent his entire career with the team, making seven All-Star teams, winning two Gold Gloves, and helping the club to a pair of playoff appearances, including its 2015 pennant.

Though he was surrounded by dysfunction in Queens under the late stages of the Wilpon family’s ownership — the financial tight-fistedness in the wake of the owners’ involvement in the Madoff scandal, the endless micromanagement of injuries, the tone-deaf approach when it came to public relations — Wright stood apart from all of that. Charismatic, exceptionally talented on both sides of the ball, with an off-the-charts work ethic, he was the Mets’ answer to Derek Jeter, an icon who avoided scandal, almost invariably said the right thing, and never did anything to embarrass himself or the franchise. Small wonder that he was named team captain in the spring of 2013, and even acquired the nickname “Captain America” while playing for Team USA in that year’s World Baseball Classic. Read the rest of this entry »

Two months ago, the Blue Jays marauded their way through the playoffs despite a bullpen they preferred not to touch with a thirty-nine-and-a-half-foot pole. They started the offseason by adding to the rotation, with Dylan Cease the big name acquisition and KBO MVP Cody Ponce an interesting flier. Now, they’ve turned their attention to relief pitching, and they’re working every angle there. They selected hard-throwing relief option Spencer Miles in the Rule 5 draft, traded for sidearmer Chase Lee, and late last week added the piece de resistance, the weirdest reliever in baseball. That’s right: Tyler Rogers and Toronto agreed to terms on a three-year, $37 million deal with a vesting option that could push it to four years and $48 million.

I’m legally obligated to lead any article about Rogers by mentioning his unconventional delivery. He throws upside down, it’s true. He throws in the low-to-mid-80s as a result, with movement that resembles nothing else in baseball. It’s hard to wrap your head around how his pitches move. His slider has huge positive vertical break; it’s a regular slider turned upside down. His fastball, naturally enough, breaks downward, which results in some incredibly counter-intuitive at-bats; despite being about 10 miles an hour faster, it falls meaningfully more than the slider on its path homeward.

With that out of the way, forget what Rogers throws like for a while. I’m sure that’s interesting to the Blue Jays, but what actually matters at the end of the day is how effective he is. He’s very effective, as it turns out. His career 2.76 ERA is flattered slightly by all his years calling spacious Oracle Park home, but not as much as you’d think. His 67 ERA- is a top-15 mark among relievers since his 2019 debut, and I actually think ERA- punishes him, because his specific game doesn’t benefit as much as most pitchers from a big outfield. He gets a ton of grounders. He perennially runs a low BABIP allowed, and it’s no fluke; batters just can’t square him up. Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Arizona Diamondbacks. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as my own observations. This is the sixth year we’re delineating between two anticipated relief roles, the abbreviations for which you’ll see in the “position” column below: MIRP for multi-inning relief pitchers, and SIRP for single-inning relief pitchers. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb.

A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.

All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every team’s list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. It can be found here. Read the rest of this entry »