Top 10 for 2026 Fantasy Baseball

Today is a day that will live in infinity,” as FDRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR….said. It will also live in your hearts and minds for the next few months as you constantly check the 2026 fantasy baseball rankings for updates on projections, rankings and just other little fun bits of tid.

Before we get into the top 10 for 2026 fantasy baseball (though I imagine every single one of you has skipped this intro), I’m gonna lay down some exposition. Here’s where you follow us on Twitter. Here’s where you follow us on Facebook. Here’s us on Youtube. Here’s us on Bluesky. Here’s us on Instagram. Here’s us on TikTok. Here’s our fantasy baseball player rater. Here’s our fantasy baseball team name generator. Here are all of our 2026 fantasy baseball rankings. Here’s the position eligibility chart for 2026 fantasy baseball. And here is a picture of my son. What a punim! You may not get all of those links in such a handy, easy-to-use format again this year, so make proper note. (Unless you just go to the top menu on this page that says “Rankings” and click it, but semantics, my over-the-internet friend, semantics.) Also, here’s Steamer’s 2026 Fantasy Baseball Projections for Hitters and 2026 Fantasy Baseball Projections for Pitchers. Rudy’s on top of it this year! Sorta, he says to note it’s Version 1.0, and tweaks will happen over the course of the next few weeks. Also, Rudy’s Draft War Room is ready for all subscribers. Subscribe now, snitches!

Now my expositional half insists I breakdown some generalizations about these 2026 fantasy baseball rankings. The 2026 fantasy baseball rankings will be an ever-evolving mass like the blob. This fantasy baseball top 10 for 2026 list is as of right now and could potentially change with a big injury or Shohei Ohtani quitting baseball because he’s bored with being the best and wants to play competitive Cornhole. (I’m not sure yet where Ohtani would rank in my Cornhole Top 10. Odds are, high!) So while it is the 2026 fantasy baseball gospel, take it with a tablet of salt. Tomorrow we will cover the rest of the top 20 for 2026 fantasy baseball, then we will go around the horn with a top 20 (more like 50) list for every position. Then for pitchers and outfielders, I’ll turn the dial to 100 (more like 120). Listed with each player are my 2026 projections. Did I consult with anyone else who does projections? It would be ignorant not to, but, in the end, these are my projections. Players need 5 games started at a position to get included in the positional rankings. If I put someone in a position, that is why. Well, that is whyahoo, actually.

Finally, as with each list in the 2026 fantasy baseball rankings, I will be mentioning where I see tiers start and stop. I look at tiers like this, if Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge are in the same tier, it doesn’t matter if one guy is ranked 2nd and one guy is ranked first, they’re both very close. It comes down to personal preference. I would prefer the guy at number one over the guy at two, but you do you, I’ll do me and let’s hope we don’t go blind. Anyway, here’s the top 10 for 2026 fantasy baseball:

NOTE: All my 2026 fantasy baseball rankings are currently available on Patreon for the price of a Starbucks coffee, if you get one of those extra grande frappuccino jobbers. Don’t wait for the rankings to come out over the next month, and get them all now.

1. Shohei Ohtani – This is the 1st tier of the 2026 fantasy baseball rankings. (Woo hoo!) This tier goes from here until Judge. I call this tier, “JOBU CAN EFF ALL THE WAY OFF!” Last year I lamented the Jobu curse of the first tier. For a few years in a row, Jobu had cursed the first tier and it was brutal to get the 1st draft pick. Acuña went 1st and almost immediately injured, Treat Urner went 1st and did nothing until the Phillies fans went opposite town on him and clapped, but it was a disappointing year, before that Bo Bichette was ranked number one–Was I literally drunk ranking Bichette number one? Now you can say, “Okay, you had literal crackers in your head,” but I promise you, I was more or less near-consensus. I don’t go far outside the box on the tippy-top ranks. They’re obvious! Or at least they seemed obvious. Also, Fantasy Pros said I had the best fantasy baseball rankings two years ago and 2nd best last year. So Trea was the best in 2023, Acuña was clearcut in 2024 and Bichette…Well, he was coming off a 2021 season when he was number one on the Player Rater, so number one ranked in 2022 couldn’t have been far off, as unlikely as it seems now. (I went back to my ranks, as far as 2013, and there were some crazy names in there — Giancarlo was in there for multiple seasons! Age comes for us all, except me. I bought the fountain of youth on a late-night informercial.) Long story short, the top picks were cursed for a few years, then last year happened and JOBU CAN EFF ALL THE WAY OFF! with his curse. We have found normalcy in The Force. Last year the top four ranked were Witt, Ohtani, Elly and Judge, and three of the four did excellent and Elly was no slouch, a near top 15 bat overall. We’re back, baby! Back to “If you don’t have the top overall pick, you’re screwed.” No, I kid, but it’s nice to get a top pick and get value, rather than being at the mercy of the Fantasy Baseball Overlord and his GERD. Last year there were very few top ranked guys who truly disappointed — *cough* Yordan *cough*. Oh, crap, I got Captain Woofluenza.

As for Ohtani, never heard of him. Who? Ohtani? Is that the guy MLB tweets about 64 times per day? The guy MLB tweets about when his dog does a successful number two? Oh yeah! I remember now! Ohtani went 55/20/.282 last year with a 2.87 ERA and 11.9 K/9, 1.7 BB/9, which are ace numbers. So, if you get conservatively 40/10/.270 this year and 130 IP of sub-3 ERA with a near-12 K/9, then– Do you hear these numbers? This guy isn’t human. Sorry, is it legal to play baseball and not be human? Is there no rule against that? Well, Manfred needs Ohtani to put butts in the seats all over the world, so human or not, it doesn’t matter. Ohtani has a full deck of Get Out Of Jail Free cards, i.e., see Ippei. He even named his dog Decoy! No, seriously, I don’t believe for a second Ohtani gambled and they pinned it on Ippei, but I also think if Ohtani were to go 40/40/4 this year with forty homers, forty steals and four murders, he’d still be playing baseball. I am merely Cust kayin’. 2026 Projections: 133/47/108/.275/16 in 583 ABs, 10-5/3.02/1.05/174 in 135 IP

2. Aaron Judge – Choosy moms choose Judge! Judgy moms judge Judge and choose Ohtani! Choosy judges mime gavels–I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you come in. I was just doing an eeny meeny miney moe between Ohtani and Judge for first or second and, well, you see how I landed. Last year, the top three on the Player Rater were Judge, Ohtani and Cal Raleigh — [places a beer bottle on Raleigh’s backside and before it can fall, Raleigh grabs it] Ooh, Raleigh fingers with the save! So, Raleigh will be ranked, when he’s ranked. I don’t want to spend too much time on that, but…wait, what was I saying, I see “but” and that’s it…Oh, that’s right, Judge or Ohtani? Well, as I always say, if a guy is in the same tier as someone else, they’re interchangeable, and Judge and Ohtani are just that. I would go Ohtani first, because 47/16 with the option for a number one starter is just better to me. If you went Judge first, you’re losing your mind. Put on a potato sack like it’s a dress and commit yourself. No, no, no, you’re not crazy. Judge is completely absurd. Actually, Judge’s 2022 was absurd, and his 2024 and 2025 were better.

Last year, Judge won his 1st batting title and had a OPS .131 higher than anyone else in MLB. In the last three years, he has the best average (.312), 2nd most homers (148), 2nd best RBIs (333), 1st in OBP (.445), 1st in SLG (.674), 1st in OPS+ (208) and he’s in a goofy park. This is the most chalk top two for fantasy baseball rankings that you’re gonna find. If you’re not drafting Ohtani or Judge, you’re just trying to be different. Drafting fantasy baseball different than others is not the flex you think it is. Just draft properly! Judge’s got to be the best 2nd best player in the league ever, right? I don’t know that for a fact, but imagine being as good as Judge, and being 2nd to Ohtani. Ya know, Zapp’s Voodoo Chips? They’re the best potato chip. Now imagine if they made them more voodoo-y, but sold them separately. That’s this whole first tier. These guys are just Voodoo-y. They’re not just capable of the top year in fantasy overall, they’re capable of the best year in fantasy ever. These two guys are absurd. Call this tier Absurdly Absurd. They’re absurd! Call them Absurdly Voodoo-y! 2026 Projections: 123/54/121/.309/10 in 553 ABs

3. Bobby Witt Jr. – This is a new tier. This tier goes from here until Witt. I call this tier, “The Third God.” Judge and Ohtani are Absurdly Voodoo-y, Witt is not. He’s The Third God. It’s excellent, just not Absurdly Voodoo-y. Do not underestimate “excellent.” You underestimate “excellent” and that shizz will knock your dopey ass out. It’s a fun time to play fantasy. It’s a great time for baseball! Shame is dead, but there’s no shame in not being Ohtani or Judge, as Witt is clearly not. And I will get to positives, and I hate getting negative, but I see Witt going first overall in front of Ohtani and Judge and those people are trying to be different. Witt is the third best player off the board. There’s no harm in that! Ohtani and Judge are a huge hurdle for anyone to, uh, hurdle. Ohtani and Judge are the needle on top of Burj Khalifa, and Witt is waving from the top deck pool. The top deck pool at Burj Khalifa is still a mighty nice view! Bobby Witt Jr. last year hit .295, .852 OPS, 47 doubles, 23 HRs, 38 steals, led majors in hits (184), and he’s the most pure 30/50/.320 hitter we have where none of those stats need a lot of squinting to see happening. Oh, and the Royals just moved in the fences! That makes him exactly the third best player. I refused to put him in the next tier, because like I say, players in the same tier should be interchangeable. Witt is not interchangeable with the guys in the next tier. He’s also not interchangeable with the guys in front of him. There’s no scenario where you should draft Witt in front of Judge or Ohtani or after Juan Soto. Bobby Witt Jr. is The Third God. 2026 Projections: 106/30/93/.304/42 in 619 ABs

4. Jose Ramirez – This is a new tier. This tier goes from here until Soto. I call this tier, “A surprise grab bag holding a G-Wagon or Toyota Tundra.” Imagine two trucks inside a giant brown paper bag. In there, there’s a G-Wagon, a $175,000 truck, and a Toyota Tundra, a $40,000 truck. Clearly, the G-Wagon is better, even if it’s just for resale. There is nothing wrong with that Tundra though. Obviously, you can sell the G-Wagon for four Tundras, so the G-Wagon is better. But the Tundra is great! Now, you have the hand big enough to pick up a truck. You stick in your giant hand and pull out one without seeing what you’re getting. That’s this tier. You might very well get a G-Wagon, but you also might get a Tundra, and that’s not bad! (This tier name brought to you from your friends down at Tustin Auto!)

As for Ramirez, he is the top player of all time for number of appearances he’s made in the top 20. Okay, no actual research was done to come to that conclusion, but I can’t think of anyone else who’s been in the top 20 for fantasy baseball as many times as Jose Ramirez. Since 2018, has he fallen out once? I don’t think so, but 2020 was a weird year. We were social distancing and wearing masks to Cinnabon. I said top 20, but it might even be the top 15 or top 12. Jose Ramirez is a stalwart, if that means what I think. Jose Ramirez is the most consistent player in the history of fantasy baseball. Wow, I am really jinxing him, huh? No, no! There’s no such thing as jinxes! (I hope.) If Bobby Witt Jr. suffers from having two giant fantasy guys in front of him, Jose Ramirez struggles with that every year. Jose Ramirez is consistently one of the top five players in the AL, but never the best. In fact (Grey’s got more!), Ramirez finished in the top five in MVP voting six times, and four times in the top three, only Mike Schmidt’s done that more for third baseman. Oh, yeah, one of the most shallow positions. Last year, third basemen were hand-in-hand with catchers. VinWins did a positional comparison, and here’s what we have:

SS: 593 AB/163 H/93 R/22 HR/81 RBI/27 SB/.275
2B: 539 AB/143 H/80 R/20 HR/74 RBI/16 SB/.266
1B: 570 AB/159 H/85 R/29 HR/97 RBI/6 SB/.278
C: 498 AB/130 H/70 R/26 HR/79 RBI/5 SB/.260
3B: 541 AB/141 H/82 R/27 HR/82 RBI/14 SB/.260

JRam is one of just 25 players in MLB history to record 250+ home runs and 250+ stolen bases in their career. Among the players on that list, Ramírez is the only primary third baseman, one of two switch-hitters (with Carlos Beltran), and one of two active players (with Jose Altuve). Ramirez only real drawback is it’s him and eight clowns piled into a Volkswagen for the Guards’ lineup. Actually, it’s not a Volkswagen, at worse, it’s a Toyota Tundra (and that’s how you land a blurb). 2026 Projections: 106/34/104/.282/35 in 604 ABs

5. Corbin Carroll – If Josh Naylor, inventor of The Naylor 27, can steal 30 bags, Corbin Carroll can steal 75 bags, easily. ACKSUALLY, he could likely steal 75 bags by the All-Star Game, steal another 70 in August [doing quick math] and have 300 steals heading into the final week of the season. What, you don’t want a 30/300 guy? Wow, picky picky! As said many times before, Corbin Carroll doesn’t seem like he wants to steal a lot, or the DBags throttle him. Doesn’t mean he’s not special. Players with 30 doubles, 15 triples and 30 homers since 1947: Corbin, Jimmy Rollins and Stan Musial. He was the first 30/30 season in DBags’ history last year. Bottom line, JRam is 34/35? Well, Corbin Carroll is that with upside. Though, in fairness to reality, Carroll has never done that before, so putting him down for 34/35 might be a little too pie-in-the-sky-ey. From Voodoo-y to Pie-in-the-sky-ey, a story of how Grey ranks. I really want to believe all of the guys in this tier are gonna be G-Wagons, and they all can be when you pull your giant hand from the paper bag, but there is nothing wrong with their floors (their Tundras). 2026 Projections: 112/29/91/.263/36 in 568 ABs

6. Elly De La Cruz – As some of you know, this offseason I went to Cincy, and it’s pretty cool to be in an old school baseball town. Los Angeles is home of the last two World Series champs, but if you asked most people you run into on the streets of LA, what they think of the Dodgers, you’d get either blank looks or maybe they’d mention Ohtani. A few maybe even Betts or Freeman, but LA is not a baseball city. It’s not a sports city. You want to know the best place for a spirulina smoothie? LA’s your town! Baseball or sports? Not so much. At best it’s a Lakers city. Cincy definitely is a sports city, and a baseball city at that, which is nutty rare like steak satay. I talked to people on the streets of Cincy about Sal Stewart and Adam Dunn and others, like some kinda bizarre Jaywalking segment. In fact, I even talked about Jay Bruce! One guy mentioned to me he thought Elly was playing hurt last year and needed more days off, and would definitely steal more this year. And a second completely unrelated person said almost identical stuff, and this was weeks before it was revealed Elly was injured last year. Are these two people doing my rankings and projections? No, I hear ya. That is fair. But Elly just turned 24 in January, and has 40/40 ability. He also cut his strikeouts from 31.3 to 25.9% and has the best chance for one of those absurd years like we saw from Acuña, Ohtani and Judge the last few years. (Also, that Cincy treats Pete Rose like he didn’t do anything wrong is classic. Without irony, they have his sliding statue aimed directly into the front door of a BetMGM.) 2026 Projections: 112/29/93/.266/46 in 601 ABs

7. Julio Rodriguez – I could’ve called this tier 30/30 or 30/50 or 40/40 or 20/20 or 25/25 or 45/45–Okay, you get the point! This tier is filled with guys who could go 30/30, but only one of them is actually projected for that — JRam. If JRod could get his act together in April, he could go 100/100. Yes, his act would have to be very together. So, why is JRod below the previous two guys even though he just went 30/30 without a huge April? An excellent question, Mr. Clunky Expositional Question! Plainly, Corbin and Elly have insane upside and JRod doesn’t feel the same way, but I wouldn’t have guessed Cal Raleigh was going to hit 60 homers last year, so who knows? I should end every blurb with “So who knows?” to really secure my title as Hedge King. 2026 Projections: 103/32/91/.271/26 in 612 ABs

8. Juan Soto – The year was 25 after 20, and Juan Soto, playing baseball between trips to Cancun in the offseason, decided to become Rickey Henderson in the 2nd half for no reason that I can ascertain other than he got a bug up his butt about getting a 40/40 season, which he just missed. He stole 27 bags in the 2nd half, because he fell asleep one night in July watching Josh Naylor. Due to The Naylor 27, Soto could steal 40-ish bags again, but I’m not banking on it. Pretty sure I’m the lowest on Sexy Dr. Pepper, per ADP, because he had 38 steals last year and seven steals the year before. He had such few steals the year before, I had to spell out the number, per Strunk and White. He also hit .263 with a slight uptick in Ks (16.7 to 19.2%). Ugh, I’m sounding downright negative about one of the most fun players in baseball. Sexy Dr. Pepper is prolly my favorite player (after Bryan Reynolds, of course). I haven’t read Eat, Pray, Love, but I can easily answer it. I’d: Eat Daniel Vogelbach, Pray Tatis stays healthy and Love Juan Soto. Therefore, by law, you cannot take this the wrong way, but 40/10/.280 is worth this draft pick, just not a top four pick, as I see him going. 2026 Projections: 123/42/112/.282/12 in 542 ABs

9. Ronald Acuña Jr. – This is a new tier. This tier goes from here until the top 20 for 2026 fantasy baseball. I call this tier, “Drafting On A Prayer.” This is like Living On A Prayer, but it’s Bon Jovi drafting fantasy baseball and following my rankings. This isn’t like drafting Austin Riley and praying. This isn’t drafting Ozzie Albies with a hope and a prayer. This isn’t Michael Harris II–Okay, why do the Braves have more question marks than the Riddler’s leotards? I don’t know, but they absolutely do. This is drafting and praying for certain things with each guy. What are we praying for with Tildaddy? Health. The difference between those other Braves names and Tildaddy is he’s a 40/20/.300 hitter without doing that much squinting. This ranking, truthfully, doesn’t even feel that risky. Last year in 338 ABs: 74/21/42/.290/9. Give Acuña a full 162 games–[Mr. Prorater breaks through the wall like Kool Aid Man] Jesus, man! Use the door! “Sorry, I just got excited. Acuña would prorate to 126/36/71/.290/15, and sorry about the wall.” Okay, fine, and that was coming off major surgery. I’d take 75% of that. [Mr. Prorater breaks through another part of the wall] Damn it, man! 2026 Projections: 108/30/61/.288/22 in 577 ABs

10. Francisco Lindor – He averages 30/30 and gets no respect at all. Lindor gets no respect while I literally say he gets no respect and give him no respect. If I had any sense in my medulla oblongata, I’d rank Lindor up by JRam and be done with it. For some reason, I can’t. I don’t know why. He gives me lower half of the top 10. Do these vibes make any real sense? Not especially. Lindor is great; he should be as high as seven overall here, shouldn’t he? No, I can’t. I mean, I could, but won’t. Sadly, for him, and only for him, I can’t trust him fully right now. The average befuddles a bit, it’s just a little too low for my tastes and to get him higher than this. I’d still draft him at 10, so it’s not like I hate him but counting on a 32-year-old to get better feels like a fool’s errand, which sounds like a healthy brand of popcorn. Lindor truly is underrated though, if you can get him here, and you should not be scared. Or scurred, if Chingy is reading. Lindor had $31.4 in fantasy value in both 2023 and 2024. Last year? $31.7. So, why Drafting On A Prayer like Jon Bongiovi if he were a nerd and not a feathered hair God? Age comes for us all and Lindor is 32, but, like Jon Bongiovi, Lindor is as rock-solid as you’re gonna find. 2026 Projections: 109/32/90/.264/26 in 613 ABs