FanGraphs Power Rankings: Offseason 2026 (No. 18–30)

We’re currently in the lull between the end of the World Series and the real start of hot stove season. Teams are just about done with the annual housekeeping necessary to prepare their rosters for the winter — the 40-man deadline is later today, while the non-tender deadline is Friday — but Josh Naylor aside, the big free agent moves are still on the horizon. That means it’s the perfect time to take stock of how each team measures up. The rankings below represent each team as it is currently constructed, based on our Depth Charts playing time projections. That should give us a pretty good idea of which clubs would be ready to compete if the season started today, and which ones still have work to do this offseason. Today I’ll cover the teams projected to finish under .500 in 2026, with those forecast for a .500 or better record to follow later this week.

Our power rankings use a modified Elo rating system. If you’re familiar with chess rankings or FiveThirtyEight’s defunct sports section, you’ll know that Elo is an elegant ranking format that measures teams’ relative strength and is very reactive to recent performance. For these offseason rankings, I’ve pulled the Depth Charts projections and calculated an implied Elo ranking for each team. Right now, our Depth Charts projections are powered entirely by the 2026 Steamer projections; the 2026 ZiPS projections will be folded in later in the offseason.

First up are the rankings, presented in a sortable table. Below that, I’ve grouped the teams into tiers, with comments on each club. You’ll notice that the official ordinal rankings don’t always match the tiers — there are times when I take editorial liberties in grouping teams together — but generally, the order is consistent. The delta column in the table below shows the change in ranking from the final regular season run of the power rankings.

…

The Giants already made one of the most interesting moves of the offseason when they hired former Tennessee head coach Tony Vitello to be their field manager. There’s sure to be an adjustment period as Vitello makes the leap from college ball to the big leagues, but his success will largely hinge on the talent Buster Posey brings in to fill out the roster. Trading for Rafael Devers this spring forced San Francisco into a win-now position without a solid foundation already in place. There’s some high-end talent on the team already, but there are also holes in the outfield, at second base, and all across the pitching staff. If they want to break out of the cycle of mediocrity they’ve been stuck in the past four years, the Giants will need to make some big moves and hope that top prospects like Bryce Eldridge can start contributing right away.

What a difference a year makes. This time last year, the Diamondbacks looked like a team on the rise. They might have missed the 2024 playoffs by a single game and failed to recapture the magic of their 2023 run to the World Series, but they won 89 games and seemed like they were ready to take a big step forward. Unfortunately, their big offseason signing, Corbin Burnes, got injured, the rest of their rotation took a big step backward, and they wound up selling off a bunch of free-agents-to-be at the trade deadline. The good news is that Geraldo Perdomo enjoyed a massive breakout this year, and Corbin Carroll and Ketel Marte were among the best players in baseball at their respective positions. That trio gives the D-backs lineup a solid foundation. The problem is that the starting rotation is in shambles following the injury to Burnes, the trade of Merrill Kelly in July, and the loss of Zac Gallen to free agency. A year after handing Burnes a $210 million contract, starting pitching is once again a crucial priority.

Of course, the Diamondbacks aren’t the only NL West team in need of rotation upgrades this offseason. Padres standouts Dylan Cease and Michael King are free agents, and Yu Darvish will miss all of 2026 following elbow surgery. Nick Pivetta was fantastic in his first year in San Diego, and Joe Musgrove should return from his own elbow surgery sometime next year, but the rest of the rotation is one giant question mark. Things are so dire that they’ve even discussed shifting Mason Miller and Adrian Morejon from the bullpen to the rotation. Either switch would leave the relief corps pretty thin, but that’s less of a concern at this point. The lineup is in much better shape, though it would be a good idea to find a power bat to man first base or designated hitter. To make everything more complicated, the Seidler family announced last week that they were exploring selling the franchise. It’s still unclear how that potential transition will affect baseball operations, though sources indicated to the San Diego Union-Tribune that it will be “business as usual” this offseason. That said, the ownership fight last offseason definitely affected the front office’s ability to spend, which leads me to believe they’ll face the same challenges this winter.

Next season will be a big transition year for the Cardinals. Chaim Bloom was installed as the new president of baseball operations at the end of the regular season, and now he can get to work shaping the roster how he sees fit. The projections don’t see a great team yet, but there are certainly players to build around here. Masyn Winn and Iván Herrera have already proven they can produce in the big leagues, and I imagine JJ Wetherholt will have an opportunity to debut next year. The biggest question is what to do with veterans Nolan Arenado and Sonny Gray. Neither will be part of the next great Cardinals team, so Bloom will have to do what John Mozeliak couldn’t: Find a trade partner to take on those big contracts. Brendan Donovan has been mentioned in a bunch of trade rumors — moving him could help create room for Wetherholt on the major league roster — though trading away Arenado could serve the same function, with Donovan sliding over to third base.

Paul Skenes won the first of what should be many Cy Young awards last week, but the Pirates lineup isn’t close to being able to support the team’s young and talented pitching staff. Rome wasn’t built in a day and Pittsburgh’s offense won’t be built in one offseason; things are dire on the big league roster. The Pirates didn’t have a qualified batter with a wRC+ over 100 in 2025, and they had just two if you lower the plate appearance threshold to 300. That means there are a lot of holes to plug, though the quick ascent of Konnor Griffin through the minor leagues this year could mean a big league debut sooner rather than later. Still, Griffin can’t fix the lineup on his own, so the team will need to invest in finding hitters who can at least provide a league-average batting line.

The Athletics have almost the exact opposite problem as the Pirates. Nick Kurtz’s historic rookie season showed he can anchor the lineup, while the break outs of Shea Langeliers, Tyler Soderstrom, and Jacob Wilson should give the A’s a solid young supporting cast going forward. But the pitching staff is another matter entirely. The hitter-friendly ballpark in West Sacramento was a significant challenge for the team; the A’s allowed nearly a full run more per game at home than they did on the road. Even if they find a way to upgrade their pitching staff, it still seems like the team will have to outslug their opponents in 2026 to have any shot at success.

The Marlins actually had a bit of momentum heading into the offseason. From September 10 through the end of the season, they had the best record in the National League at 13-4, and wound up improving on their 2024 win total by 17 games. The projections see them as a 79-win team, 24th in the majors right now, and that’s with no free agents leaving holes on the roster. You can look at that reality in one of two ways: Either the foundation that’s in place isn’t projected to be that good despite the strong finish to the season, or there’s plenty of room for growth without having to backfill a bunch of positions. Hopefully the pitching staff enjoys much better health in 2026, though it’s an open question whether Miami will trade away Sandy Alcantara. Their ace bounced back with a strong second half and could be an enticing trade chip if the team wants to infuse its roster with additional young talent.

The final two teams in this tier made surprising postseason appearances in 2025, though the projections view a return to the playoffs next year as a long shot. The Guardians’ incredible run to claim the AL Central division title provided some fantastic drama down the stretch, but their roster was pretty flawed despite the late-season hot streak; the team outperformed their pythagorean record by eight wins and their BaseRuns record by 11, with the 2026 projections keying in on that underlying performance. Still, there is some cause for hope in the form of a trio of young hitters — Travis Bazzana, George Valera, and Chase DeLauter — that could make a big impact next year and help buoy an organization still reeling from the Emmanuel Clase/Luis L. Ortiz gambling scandal.

The Reds didn’t finish the season with the same kind of momentum the Guardians did, instead taking advantage of a stumbling Mets team to claim the final NL Wild Card spot. The pitching looks like it’s in good shape. The starting rotation was the third best in baseball this year, and there are a few more top pitching prospects who look like they’re close to making an impact in the big leagues. The problem is the development of Cincinnati’s young position players. Just two batters crossed the 1.5-WAR threshold in 2025, and guys like Matt McLain, Spencer Steer, Gavin Lux, and Noelvi Marte have settled in as merely average-ish regulars rather than core pieces of the Reds’ lineup. Worryingly, no one in that quartet is projected to accumulate more than 1.5 WAR in 2026. It might be time to cut bait on some of them, and try to find some impact hitters outside the organization.

The Angels have been stuck in neutral for the last decade. Their last winning season came in 2015 and their last playoff appearance was in 2014. Shortsighted spending, largely underwhelming drafts, and poor player development have undermined any ability to build a sustainable winner. Ownership refuses to tear everything down and also won’t invest the necessary resources to fix the glaring issues on the roster. There’s perhaps no better example of these kinds of half measures than the one-year deal Kurt Suzuki signed to be the Angels’ manager in 2026. Instead of committing to a long-term leader for the clubhouse, the team installed someone who is already a lame duck and will be fighting for his job throughout the season. Jo Adell’s 2025 breakout was nice to see and Zach Neto looks like a key building block for the team’s future, but Mike Trout’s star power looks to have fully waned at this point in his career. There’s a ton of work to be done to get this organization back on track, and it’s going to take more than a single offseason.

The Nationals moved on from Mike Rizzo in July and hired Paul Toboni to take over as president of baseball operations, marking a new direction for the franchise. Toboni now faces the difficult task of modernizing and reimagining the organization’s priorities and development practices. One of the first big decisions he’ll have to tackle is what to do with MacKenzie Gore; the left-hander has two years of team control remaining and could bring back a huge haul of prospects if the Nats were to make him available this offseason. Of course, Toboni’s job will be made a little easier thanks to the one thing the Nats have that the other teams in this tier don’t: a burgeoning superstar in James Wood. If the team can create an environment where Wood is able to thrive, he and a supporting cast that includes CJ Abrams, Dylan Crews, and Daylen Lile could short circuit the current rebuilding cycle by a few years.

Over the final three months of the regular season, the White Sox had a better record than three other American League teams, and their run scoring was smack dab in the middle of the league. That might not seem like all that much to celebrate, but it represents a significant step forward for the ballclub. Colson Montgomery and Kyle Teel had encouraging debuts this summer, and there’s a gaggle of top prospects who could make an impact in the big leagues in 2026. It’s still going to take a lot to build another contender on the South Side, but the first core pieces of Chicago’s next great roster are beginning to fall into place.

Under normal circumstances, you might credit the Rockies for making an unconventional hire to lead their baseball operations department. For an organization that’s notoriously insular, adding someone from outside of owner Dick Monfort’s inner circle should be seen as a positive step forward. Except they went so far afield, they wound up hiring Paul DePodesta. The very same Paul DePodesta who cut his teeth in baseball with the Moneyball A’s around the turn of the century, and who has been out of the game for a decade while serving as the Cleveland Browns’ chief strategy officer. Even if you set aside some of the questionable moves the Browns made during his tenure (including what is widely regarded as the worst transaction in NFL history), baseball has advanced so much since DePodesta last worked in a front office that he’ll probably spend his first year playing some amount of catchup. Of course, the reason this front office drama is grabbing headlines is because the on-field product is absolutely atrocious. The projections peg the Rockies as being close to a 100-loss team as currently constituted, and remember that’s the 50th percentile projection. Those projections should improve slightly as DePodesta starts to clean up this roster, but the team is climbing out of an incredibly deep hole.