Excuse Me?! Our Bold Predictions for the 2026 Season

Every year for Opening Day, I ask the FanGraphs staff to predict the season’s award winners, playoff field, and eventual World Series Champion. Those predictions tend to be heavily influenced by our playoff odds, projections, and prospect rankings, and while I appreciate the instinct to lean on data to make our guesses more educated, the results can feel a little chalky at times. That’s why I’ve starting asking our writers to make another prediction — a bold prediction. One that might be a little spicy, or perhaps a little silly. A prediction that eschews the obvious, but is still grounded in reality, even if only by one foot. Nineteen of our writers across FanGraphs and RotoGraphs answered the bell, including me. Will any of these predictions prove to be correct? Who knows! Let’s watch 2,430 games and find out. – Meg Rowley

We’ll See a Front Office Gambling Scandal

I realize this isn’t the most fun prediction you’re going to read here, but this just sort of strikes me as next. We’ve seen coach scandals, player scandals, and interpreter scandals. Well, front offices feature plenty of hyper-competitive people, many of whom are experts in the kind of risk analysis involved in gambling, and I don’t see any particular reason that they’d be immune to a disease that has infected so many other parts of baseball over the last few years. I think it’s more likely that the next scandal we see involves more minor league players, but we’re supposed to go bold here. It would be harder for a front office member to get caught. They’re not subject to the same public scrutiny that players are, and they can’t affect the outcome of a game as directly. They’d probably have to screw up in a bigger way. But it certainly seems possible.  – Davy Andrews

Someone Will Ground Into a Record Number of Double Plays

The single-season record for double plays grounded into is 36, set by Jim Rice in 1984. I admit I’m slightly obsessed with this number; I write about it semi-frequently, most recently in the context of Junior Caminero back in July. Caminero had hit into 22 double plays in his first 333 plate appearances; his record-bothering pace cooled off a little, but he still ended with 31 GIDPs, the highest single-season total in 11 years.

Caminero is slow, right-handed, hits in the middle of the order, and hits the ball on the ground hard and frequently. That’s a ripe combination, a petri dish for twin killings. And he’s not alone. Carlos Correa hit into 30 double plays in 2023; last year, in addition to Caminero, Pete Alonso, Jose Altuve, and Iván Herrera all broke 20. Herrera did it in just 107 games; he and his 23rd-percentile sprint speed are slated to get more time at DH this year.

The fact that this record has stood for more than 40 years tells you how big a number 36 is. But a player can hit into multiple double plays in a single game if the situation is right. Batters are hitting the ball harder, as shift-restricted infields always keep at least one player in shouting distance of second base. This record is going to fall eventually; it might as well happen now. – Michael Baumann

Chandler Simpson Will Hit an Over-the-Fence Home Run

Before Eddie Gaedel took his one plate appearance with the St. Louis Browns on August 19, 1951, team owner Bill Veeck reportedly told Gaedel that he had a sniper on the stadium roof to take him out if he swung the bat. I don’t think the Rays have such a harsh arrangement with Chandler Simpson hitting fly balls, but with a bat so punchless it breaks the bottom of the 20-80 scale for raw power, swinging for the fences should never be part of his game.

As such, the big fly won’t come at a critical moment. It won’t be to lead off a game; it won’t be to tie one or take the lead; and it certainly won’t be to walk one off. But are the Rays going to stop Simpson from taking a big hack when they’re up or down by a bunch of runs, facing a position player? With Tropicana Field’s dimensions, all it would take is Simpson hooking one right down the line against a fastball coming in at batting practice velocity. The right field foul pole at the Trop is 325 feet away, a distance he matched or exceeded on eight batted balls last year. Fenway Park and Yankee Stadium are friendly road parks for this feat, too. – Jon Becker

Andrew Benintendi Will Hit 30-Plus Home Runs

For many hitters, predicting 30 home runs would not be so bold. Even those who’ve yet to reach that mark could believably make a tweak here or there to push themselves beyond that nice, round number. But entering his 11th season, nearly 5,000 plate appearances into his career, Andrew Benintendi has never hit more than 20 home runs in a season. A 50% increase on a well-established limit seems rather bold.

Benintendi first reached 20 home runs back in 2017, his first full big league season. He hit fewer the next year but was otherwise excellent, justifying his status as a former top-five overall prospect with a 4.4-WAR campaign. Then his career went backwards. His power numbers dropped, his defense disappeared, and he bounced from team to team before signing with the White Sox in 2023. His numbers tanked further, posting an 88 wRC+ with just five homers in his first year on the South Side.

Then in 2024, Benintendi doubled his barrel rate, swatting 20 homers. In 2025, he nearly doubled it again, swatting 20 more. It was this latest performance that caught my eye. He didn’t fundamentally improve his bat speed or his ability to hit the ball hard. But last year, more than two-thirds of his batted balls were in the air, and more than a quarter were in the air to the pull side — both top-25 marks. Still just 31, Benintendi now looks like a modern hitter capable of modern home run totals, and he wouldn’t be the first player to put it all together in his 30s. Perhaps 2026 is the year Benintendi makes us believe again. – Ryan Blake

The Rockies Will Win Fewer Games in 2026 Than They Did in 2025

The thing I’m predicting basically never happens. The 2021 Diamondbacks and Orioles, owners of the worst records in baseball that year, improved by 22 and 31 wins, respectively, the following season. The Nationals went 55-107 in 2022, then improved by 16 games the next year. The 2024 A’s were 19 wins better than the 2023 squad. The White Sox went from 41 wins in 2024 to 60 in 2025. When a team is the worst in baseball, it’s usually the result of bad luck combining with outlier issues that won’t repeat. In fact, my bold prediction last year was that the White Sox would add the most wins in baseball, and I came really close: The pesky Blue Jays put up a 20-win improvement, but the Sox were second.

Will that happen for the Rockies, who last year mustered just 43 wins? Obviously, our model thinks so, projecting them for 63 wins, a 20-win increase. Vegas is less sanguine, with an over/under of 55.5. Winning fewer than 50 games would be a huge upset. Winning fewer than they did in 2025? Basically unheard of. It’s a sucker’s bet. But I think they’re going to do it. Our projections think they’ll have five positions worth 1.5 or more WAR this year; they had two last year. They didn’t turn much of the team over, and Willi Castro, the best hitter they signed, was barely above replacement level himself in 2025. I’m fading the projections. Never count the Rockies out – at least in this one very specific situation. – Ben Clemens

JJ Wetherholt Will Win National League Rookie of the Year

Konnor Griffin is quite likely to be a meaningfully better player than JJ Wetherholt. This is both the official position of the FanGraphs prospect team and probably the majority opinion of people on Earth. The same is true of Nolan McLean in relation to Wetherholt, even if the Mets right-hander is extraneous to my narrow point about the difference between immediate and long-term projections.

It’s a testament to Griffin’s brilliance that he’s even in position to compete for NL Rookie of the Year in the same season as Wetherholt, let alone one of the favorites, even though the former will start the year in Triple-A and the latter will open the season with the Cardinals. When they were drafted two spots apart in 2024, Griffin was a super athletic Mississippi high school star dogged by hit tool questions surrounding his footwork in the box, while Wetherholt was an uber-polished college bat, which is supposed to equate to a big head start.

Griffin has since revealed himself to be the sort of planet-devouring prospect who addresses flaws in his game at warp speed and makes a mockery of reasonable development timelines. But Wetherholt has remained exactly the sort of precociously polished hitter who can hit the ground running at the highest level, and rookie position players tend to be slightly less hemmed in by workload restrictions than their pitching counterparts and often aren’t as dogged by injury risk. Statistically, an average miss rate on heaters stopped us from slapping a future 70 grade on Wetherholt’s hit tool, but he can vary his swing to get on plane with any fastball type and tracks spin as well or better than anyone in the minors, to back up his .304/.418/.487 career line in pro ball.

Why all this focus on hit tool? Because it’s the one point of advantage for Wetherholt over Griffin, and this coming season is probably the biggest that advantage is ever going to be. – James Fegan

More Pitchers Will Lose When Throwing a Complete Game Than Win

Fifteen years ago, there were 173 complete games league-wide, about one per day. There were only 29 last season, which was actually one higher than 2024’s total. With large pitching staffs, strict pitch counts, and a pervasive dread of the third-time-through-the-order penalty, pitchers need to hit the Goldilocks Zone to finish what they started: The pitcher should be a veteran, the game ought to be relatively close but not so tight that the manager reaches for their closer, and the temperatures better not be frigid. Barring significant roster or rule changes, pitchers will likely see the ninth inning ever more infrequently going forward.

Maybe it’s a decade too early to forecast the end of the nine-inning complete game, as there were only a couple of complete games that fell short of that threshold last year. But by the mathematical property of eight being one less than nine, inevitably we’ll reach the point where eight-inning complete games become not just theoretically more feasible but also more frequent than their nine-inning counterparts. Let’s be bold — 2026 is the year it happens. Just don’t hurt yourself celebrating. – Brendan Gawlowski

The Royals Will Have Their Best Season Since 2015

The Royals spent the past decade mostly failing to live up to expectations following their 2014–15 success, finishing at .500 just once from 2016–23 while losing at least 103 games three times. A strong rotation and the maturation of Bobby Witt Jr. carried them to 86 victories and a Wild Card Series win in 2024, but they regressed to 82 wins last year. Amid numerous injuries, their pitching was quite good — they ranked second in the American League in run prevention (3.93 per game) — but their offense was the league’s third-worst (4.02 runs per game). Thirteen of the 17 Royals with at least 100 plate appearances finished with a wRC+ below 100, while only Witt and third baseman Maikel Garcia finished above 1.5 WAR. Top prospect Jac Caglianone hit a cringeworthy .157/.237/.295 (46 wRC+) in 62 games, with -1.6 WAR.

Maybe it’s the espresso fumes from the strong World Baseball Classic performances of Caglianone and Vinnie Pasquantino — not to mention tournament MVP Garcia for the winning Team Venezuela — but I’m picking the Royals to have their best season since 2015. The offense will improve, and not just because Kauffman Stadium’s fences have moved in; new left fielder Isaac Collins, a full season of catcher/DH Carter Jensen (my AL Rookie of the Year pick), and the continued development of Caglianone will help raise the floor. I’ve tabbed Witt for AL MVP, and am banking that rebounds by Cole Ragans and Seth Lugo will help make the rotation a formidable one as the team wins just its second division title in the past 40 years. – Jay Jaffe

Connelly Early Will Be Boston’s Best Starter Not Named Garrett Crochet

The Red Sox made several notable additions to their starting staff over the offseason, signing Ranger Suarez as a free agent and trading for Sonny Gray and Johan Oviedo. Along with holdovers Garrett Crochet and Brayan Bello, the trio of newcomers comprises what projects as a markedly improved rotation. Boston also has Kutter Crawford and Patrick Sandoval, both of whom are returning from injury, waiting in the wings. Moreover, Payton Tolle, who ranks 18th in our Top 100, is not only knocking on the door, he is looking to kick in in.

And then there is Connelly Early, who at No. 38 is himself a denizen of our Top 100. The soon-to-be-24-year-old left-hander has just 23 big league innings under his belt, 19 1/3 in the regular season and 3 2/3 in last year’s Wild Card Game 3. While promising, Early not only has less of a track record than all but Tolle on Boston’s starter depth chart, Tolle is considered to have the higher ceiling.

According my crystal ball, Early will do more than simply establish himself this season; he will outperform all the other members of the Red Sox rotation with the exception of Crochet. Featuring an expansive repertoire that he augments with a combination of guile and steely-eyed calm, Early is a pitcher’s pitcher. It is probably too soon to anoint him the next Bruce Hurst or John Tudor, but the erstwhile Red Sox southpaws nonetheless serve as solid comps. On the doorstep of his first Opening Day, Early is poised to excel. – David Laurila

A Team Will Blow Through Its Draft Pool

This is not a new idea. Indeed, it has existed for as long as the current bonus rules and penalties associated with the amateur draft have been in place, and has precedent in the international market, where teams often strategically exceeded their bonus pools a decade or so ago before new rules were implemented. But I believe a team blowing through their draft pool is as feasible this year as it’s ever going to be, not just because this year’s draft has an enticing depth of high school talent, but also because of the way a team exceeding their pool this year might interact with the seams of the new CBA in a way that takes some of the teeth out of the penalties.

As a reminder, here are penalties associated with a team exceeding its pool:

“A club outspending its bonus pool by 0-5 percent pays a 75 percent tax on the overage. At higher thresholds, a team loses future picks: a first-rounder and a 75 percent tax for surpassing its pool by more than 5 and up to 10 percent; a first- and a second-rounder and a 100 percent tax for more than 10 and up to 15 percent; and two first-rounders and a 100 percent tax for more than 15 percent.”

Historically, these penalties have been enough to dissuade teams from overspending. A team would need to see a one-year payoff that exceeds the severity of the penalty to make it worth exploring, and these rules make it difficult to execute that. For instance, the Orioles’ bonus pool was nearly $20 million last year; 15% of that original amount is $3 million, the bonus of a first-round prospect. So they could have signed the equivalent of one extra first-round prospect, but it would have cost them $6 million instead of $3 million, and they would have lost a first- and second-rounder this year. 

But if a team thinks the talent in the following year’s draft is poor, or if a high payroll is going to cause their pick to slide and therefore be less painful to lose, then they might at least consider the near-term splurge more than they would in a typical year.

This brings us to the upcoming CBA negotiations. There are people in baseball who think MLB will try to eliminate high school player draft eligibility in the next Basic Agreement. The owners certainly have incentive to do so. Bryce Harper and Manny Machado got the initial free agent contracts they did in part because they hit the market at such a young age, which is only possible for players who are drafted out of high school and then race through the minors. Making everyone go to college (without altering the current rule that players who matriculate to college must stay there for three years before they’re draft-eligible again) means North American players would enter pro ball at age 21 or 22 and hit free agency at age 28 in the absolute quickest of cases. That means fewer free agent dollars for the elite Machado/Harper class of player.

If that happens and the college eligibility rules remain unchanged (again, that part is important), there’s going to be a huge dip in draft talent for a couple of years. If a team thinks that’s going to happen, then why would they care if they lose their first- and second-rounder the following year? The teams that have the largest base spending pools (this year, that’s the Braves, Astros, Cardinals, Rays, Rockies, and Pirates) and can add a meaningful group while staying under the 15% threshold (and therefore lose picks in just the following year’s draft) are the teams that should most consider doing this, though only after working contacts in the Commissioner’s office to gauge the changes that might be coming to the draft. – Eric Longenhagen

Four Teams From the AL East Will Make the Playoffs, but None Will Advance Past the ALDS

Last year, three teams from the AL East made it into the playoffs; I boldly predicted that just one would end up playing in October, and I was very wrong. This year, I think that the three teams that made the postseason in 2025 will be joined by a fourth team from the division. It’ll probably be the Orioles, but I wouldn’t be so quick to count out the Rays. The Blue Jays, Yankees, and Red Sox spent this offseason in full win-now mode, upgrading positions and patching up holes on their rosters. Baltimore did the same, though the club appears to be a step behind the top three teams in the division thanks to a pitching staff that still doesn’t project to be a strength.

Really, this prediction isn’t as much about the strength of the AL East as it is the relative weakness of the other two divisions in the league. In the AL West, the Astros and Rangers are projected to finish right around .500 and are counting on a lot of things going right to even get to that point. The Athletics have built an impressive lineup, but they seem likely to be let down by their complete lack of pitching. In the AL Central, the Guardians were pretty lucky to win the division last year and I don’t think lightning will strike twice. The Royals are a team on the rise, but I think we’re underestimating how much of an effect the new dimensions of Kauffman Stadium will have on a pitching staff that allows a ton of balls in play (they were 23rd in strikeout rate last year).

The second part of this prediction has everything to do with the strength of the Mariners and Tigers. Both of those teams are clear favorites in their respective divisions and have rosters built to make deep postseason runs. Even if four teams from the AL East make it into the playoffs, they’ll run into a pair of buzzsaws in the Divisional round and get knocked out before making much noise. – Jake Mailhot

Neither Shohei Ohtani Nor Aaron Judge Will Win MVP This Year

I wanted to double down on my bold prediction from last year, that Corbin Carroll will become the fifth 20/20/20/20 (that is, 20 doubles, 20 triples, 20 homers and 20 steals) player in AL/NL history. He finished three triples shy of that feat, and though he may never get that close again, his chase made every one of his gappers all the more exciting. I want to root for that again, but picking it felt like cheating.

Anyway, about my actual bold prediction. It sounds crazy. Shohei Ohtani has won three in a row and four in the last five seasons, with his only loss in that span coming to Aaron Judge in 2022; meanwhile, Judge has won the last two AL MVPs and three out of the last four, with his only loss in that span coming to Ohtani in an injury-shortened 2023. Maybe it’s plausible that one of them will fall short in 2026, but both of them? That’s a stretch.

And yet, Judge turns 34 a month from now, and it’s quite possible that the effects of aging could keep him from posting yet another 10-WAR season. Say his production dips to his Depth Charts projection of .287/.418/.596, 44 home runs, 174 wRC+, and 7.4 WAR, or even to the more optimistic OOPSY projection of .304/.424/.651, 52 home runs, 193 wRC+, 9.1 WAR. In either scenario, I could see Bobby Witt Jr., whose 8.0 WAR in 2025 represented a step backward, finishing with at least 9.0 WAR and leading the Royals to the playoffs; if that happens, I think he’d win MVP over Judge.

As for Ohtani, last month Davy Andrews laid out the circumstances in which Juan Soto could beat out the Dodgers superstar for the NL MVP:

Say, in a future season, instead of producing a 172 wRC+, Ohtani runs the 142 he put up in 2022. It’s enough to keep him in Soto’s league, but it’s still clearly a bit behind a typical Soto season. (Soto’s career wRC+ is 158, and only once in the last six seasons has he finished with a mark below 150.) Now, say Ohtani’s pitching falls off some, too. He makes 25 starts, but his ERA and FIP are up around 4.00. It would add two or three wins to his WAR total, pushing him safely past Soto. Once again, he would put up more value than anybody else, and once again he’d be doing it in a way that nobody else can compete with. But crucially, he’d no longer be spectacular in either facet of the game. He’d be a great hitter who’s also not that far removed from an innings eater. That would make him the undeniable leader in WAR, but we might start to view him a little differently. We might start to see a distinction between the most valuable player in the league and the Most Valuable Player award winner.

I don’t think Ohtani is going to fall off quite that much in 2026, but I do think that Davy’s analysis here is right. If Ohtani has a similar season to his 2021 campaign — for which he won his first MVP, and combined for roughly 8.0 WAR — then I think someone else would have a good shot at winning the award. I believe that the 27-year-old Soto is still getting better, to the point where I expect him to at least come close to matching the 8.3 WAR he put up in 2024 with the Yankees. If that happens, the award just might go to Soto. – Matt Martell

A Player Will Hit the IL After Taking Medical Advice From a Chatbot

A chatbot-induced IL stint might feel farfetched when you consider that pro ball players have access to a full staff of physical and mental health professionals within their organizations, and the resources to consult with their own doctors and trainers if they prefer. But consider that some players would rather tote around a bottle of Pepto-Bismol every day and sip on it in direct eyeshot of the team nutritionist than walk across the food room and ask an expert in the field if there’s anything to be done about persistent tummy aches.

I get it. Asking for help is hard; it can be embarrassing, or be seen as a sign of weakness. Asking a chatbot removes the risk of sounding stupid at work. And sometimes players have valid reasons for not wanting to share medical information with their employers, so they seek outside help. But just like the rest of us, they aren’t always great at vetting their sources (see: Bryce Harper’s odyssey with raw milk and blood filtering, or the entire league’s brief infatuation with Phiten necklaces). If players are willing to take dietary advice from unqualified podcasters and try every junk science solution that comes across their Instagram feed, then why not see if a chatbot knows what’s up with a weird skin growth. Or heck, maybe it has thoughts about swing mechanics? Justin Steele recently admitted to having a 90-minute conversation with Grok (the chatbot from xAI), and I’m sure he’s not the only player yukking it up with one of the robot friends that now live inside our pocket computers. – Kiri Oler

Maikel Garcia Will Out-WAR Bobby Witt Jr.

Do I feel great about the most straightforward path to this prediction coming true involving an injury to Bobby Witt Jr.? I do not! Team USA’s gloomy, martial vibe might have been a drag on the WBC, but Witt’s play at short was electric. In a Judge-less world, he’s the odds on AL MVP favorite. I wish him no harm! But I also don’t think he has to tweak a hamstring or decide he wants to cobble shoes for this prediction to come true. Maikel Garcia went from a light-hitting third baseman bolstered by strong defense to a five-win monster who socked 16 home runs and posted a 120 wRC+ to go along with some of the best defensive metrics in the sport (13 DRS, 14 FRV) in 2025. So what changed? Well, Garcia got a bit stronger and stopped hitting the ball on the ground quite so much (though to be clear, he still hits it on the ground a lot), opting instead for more and harder contact in the air. And while he still isn’t a bopper, the improved quality of contact allowed his already strong approach (his whiff and chase numbers were good even when he had a garbo wRC+) to play up. Add some stout defense and a bit of speed on the basepaths, and you have an All-Star.

Now, Garcia could go back to hitting too many grounders tomorrow; the uptick in power could be a blip. He could decide he wants to cobble shoes. But we’re talking about a great athlete who made a meaningful adjustment to better leverage the skills he already has, and who’d be playing shortstop on most teams. I think he’ll sustain his gains from 2025 and build on them, hitting for a line that resembles a peak Nolan Arenado season — say his .293/.358/.533 effort from 2022 — with the power dialed down slightly and the baserunning dialed way up. (I might just be describing Geraldo Perdomo’s 2025.) The league will adjust to him, but he will adjust back. He doesn’t need Witt to join the circus to out-WAR him, though of course, it wouldn’t hurt. – Meg Rowley

The Orioles Will Become the Third Team in History With Five 30-plus Home Run Hitters

Only twice in major league history has a team been able to boast five hitters with at least 30 home runs each. The 2019 Minnesota Twins were fueled by Nelson Cruz (41), Max Kepler (36), Miguel Sanó (34), Eddie Rosario (32), and Mitch Garver, who hit 31 in just 359 plate appearances. In 2023, the Atlanta Braves were powered by Matt Olson (54), Ronald Acuña Jr. (41), Marcell Ozuna (40), Austin Riley (37), and Ozzie Albies (33). Ironically, Rosario was also on that team, though he hit just 21 home runs that year. The 2026 Baltimore Orioles will become the third team with five 30-plus home run hitters.

Pete Alonso has launched between 34 and 53 in every season since entering the league in 2019, excluding the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign. Gunnar Henderson smashed 37 dingers in 2024 and may have done so in 2025 if not for a shoulder injury that bothered him all season. Fueled by a career-high 13.7% barrel rate, Taylor Ward knocked out 36 home runs last year. He will enjoy playing in Oriole Park, a ballpark with the second-highest home run Park Factor in 2025 (121).

The final two will be Tyler O’Neill and Colton Cowser, both of whom will rank in the top 10% in hard-hit and barrel rate. Samuel Basallo will fall short, but certainly has 30-home run seasons on the horizon. – Vlad Sedler

Ryan McMahon Will Hit 30 Home Runs for the Yankees

Rarely do you project a hitter to get better after leaving Colorado, and yet a full season in New York will bring out the best in Ryan McMahon. His new home park has been the fifth-best venue for lefty home runs over the last three years, with a 118-park factor, 13 points higher than Colorado’s 105. Perhaps more important are the other AL East parks that he’ll visit. His new division offers an 101 average park factor for lefty homers, ranging from Baltimore at 125 to Boston at 87. That 101 average is 10 points higher than in the NL West. San Diego (90), San Francisco (78), and Arizona (77) are a lefty gauntlet with an 82 average, compared to Toronto (102), Tampa Bay (90 – I used 2022-24 for Tropicana Field), and Boston (87) sitting at 93. And while Los Angeles sits fourth overall for lefty home runs at 119, you have to contend with Dodgers pitching to take advantage!

McMahon has the punch to take advantage of these parks. He’s been a 20-plus home run hitter for the last five years, peaking at 24 back in 2019. Since 2021, he’s 21st in hard-hit rate (48%) and 26th in barrel rate (11%). He’s 34th in Statcast’s Bat Speed metric, which has only been tracked since 2023, and has improved each year, going from the 53rd percentile to the 61st and finally up to the 77th last year. He feels like a classic Coors Hangover guy. I don’t even need a gaudy HR/FB rate for this to come through, but if McMahon finds his way back to the marks he posted from 2019-20 (26%), then I’m moonwalking to the finish line with this one! – Paul Sporer

MLB and the MLBPA Will Agree on a New CBA Before the End of the 2026 Season

Even after a very successful World Baseball Classic, there’s a sense of dread hanging over the league, as it’s hard to forget the real possibility of a lockout following the 2026 season. But what if that doesn’t happen? While MLBPA interim executive director Bruce Meyer is reportedly more willing than Tony Clark was to lose games to get the best possible CBA, paradoxically that willingness might help close a deal rather than prevent one.

My belief is that with an experienced litigator heading the MLBPA, the league’s owners will be less inclined to veer off into areas that aren’t central to the negotiations, such as proposing making players free agents when they’re 29 1/2 or replacing the arbitration system with salaries based on FanGraphs WAR.

I’m also not convinced that the owners are as set on a salary cap as many others are. The fact is, the revenue sharing system functions as a de facto soft salary cap as it’s currently designed, and it already achieves most of the owners’ ends. The system to make a hard salary cap work would also likely expose wider gulfs between the teams in the largest markets and those in the smallest ones. Sometimes, demands are simply negotiating positions.

In addition, the owners and players appear very interested in the 2028 Summer Olympics, and a prolonged negotiation that drags well into the 2027 season could imperil the participation of big leaguers in those Games. Finally, the league’s national broadcast deals only run through 2028, and one has to think that losing games in 2027 would make the next round of negotiations for those deals more challenging (and potentially less lucrative).

Now, the worst-case scenario could come to pass, but at least right now, I think there’s a good chance it’s all just a pig in a poke. – Dan Szymborski

At Least One Team Will Make Their First Playoff Appearance Since 2020 (or Earlier)

Over the last five postseasons, 25 of the 30 major league teams have made at least one appearance. More than half of big league teams (16) have appeared in at least two of the last five postseasons. And then you have the Angels, Athletics, Nationals, Pirates, and Rockies. Yes, even the White Sox have made the postseason since 2020. The decade has been unkind to that quintet, but this year things change! That’s right, this is the year the Rockies win the West! No, wait, too bold. But I do think two of those five teams – the Pirates and Athletics – are building something interesting. And I think one of them finds their way in.

The A’s offense can hang with anyone (Non-Dodgers Division), and I think they have enough competent pitching mixed with some upside arms to put together a strong season. Plus, it might only take 86-87 wins to get in; playing in a division that hasn’t had a team win more than 90 games since 2022 should help. Pittsburgh, meanwhile, is the opposite. The pitching is loaded with talent, and I think the offense can do more than enough. Start with a cup of bounce backs from returning players; mix in a raised floor with new additions; sprinkle in a dash of excitement from a Rookie of the Year candidate. That sounds like a recipe for October baseball. – Chad Young

Shohei Ohtani Will Be a Cy Young finalist

As the 2025 season concluded, I started my 2026 fantasy draft prep by digging for any late-season breakouts. I started with some simple stats. Here is the K-BB% leaderboard for the final month:

Ohtani snuck in as one of the top arms, so I expanded my search to include all the National League starters from the time Ohtani debuted on June 16:

Again, a top-five showing while coming back from Tommy John surgery. Ohtani continued that performance in the postseason with a 25.3% K-BB% and a 2.64 xFIP.

And he might have another gear. Historically, pitchers perform better the year after they return from TJ, with their ERA dropping by 0.46 on average. Ohtani showed he was a top starter on a per-inning basis.

It will be tough for him to win because his innings will be limited, even if he is healthy. Some ace (Sánchez, Sale, Skenes, Yamamoto) will likely also stay healthy for the entire season and edge out Ohtani on volume. Even so, I see him being an MVP and Cy Young finalist. How cool is that? – Jeff Zimmerman