Category: Sports News

With the 2025 MLB regular season behind us, it’s time to review what we learned from a fantasy perspective and how we can apply it to next year.

In the coming days throughout October, we’ll be breaking down the standout seasons, the breakout candidates, the prospects to know, and our early 2026 rankings. We started with catcher last week, and now we'll head over to first base.

Way-Too-Early 2026 Fantasy Baseball Top 300 Rankings

Aaron Judge or Shohei Ohtani at the top? Our early 2026 Top 300 rankings highlight key fantasy storylines heading into the MLB offseason.

• Matthew Pouliot,

2025 POSITION BREAKDOWN: FIRST BASE

️ STATE OF THE POSITION

There were 17 first basemen who earned at least $10 of value this season, according to Fangraph's Player Rater. That was the most for any infield position, which hints at the depth we have at the first base position. Some of that is the old stalwarts like Freddie Freeman, Matt Olson, Bryce Harper, Vladimir Guerrero, Pete Alonso, and Yandy Diaz. However, we also had young players like Nick Kurtz, Vinnie Pasquantino, Michael Busch, and Tyler Soderstrom emerge as consistent producers this season. Whenyou add to that, players like Rafael Devers and Willson Contreras gaining first base eligibility, this is probably the deepest the position has ever been, and we haven't yet talked about Christian Walker, who is coming off of a down year, Spencer Torkelson, who made the most of his second chance, and Ben Rice, who may actually get a chance to be the every day first baseman next year if the Yankees move on from Paul Goldschmidt.

As it stands, all is well with the first base landscape, and while it's tempting to try and lock in one of the elite bats at the position, this might be the best position to wait on in drafts and still find value with a middle-round starter.

2025’s Top Ten First Basemen

1. Pete Alonso (Free Agent)

.272/.347/.524, 38 HR, 87 R, 126 RBI, 1 SB

The Polar Bear had his best season yet after signing a two-year deal to return to the Mets, and played so well that he will almost certainly opt out of the final year of his contract and test the free agent waters again. Alonso set career highs in batting average, plate appearances, and barrel rate while posting his sixth straight full season with at least 34 home runs. In non-COVID seasons, Alonso averages 41.3 home runs per game, which is tremendous consistency and value from a power standpoint. The big reason why his fantasy value jumped this year, in addition to hitting behind Juan Soto and driving in 126 runs, was that Alonso went to a more all-fields approach and trusted his power to play regardless. He had the lowest pull rate of his career and the lowest fly ball rate of his career, instead focusing on hard line drives. He was also more aggressive in the zone than he had been since 2022, which allowed him to improve his quality of contact overall despite swinging and missing a bit more. Oh, and he also set the Mets franchise record for home runs. Not a bad season.

2. Josh Naylor (Free Agent)

.295.353/.462, 20 HR, 81 R, 92 RBI, 30 SB

What a wild season for Josh Naylor. We kinda knew his 31 home run season in 2024 was a bit of a fluke, but he found new ways to produce fantasy value by improving his batting average and shattering his career-high in stolen bases. Without making a drastic change in approach, Naylor saw a huge increase in his batting average, which sounded a few alarm bells. He was a bit more aggressive outside of the zone, but his contact rate was identical to last year. He did see more pitches in the zone, so perhaps being in a deeper lineup helped him, but his pull rates and fly ball rates were all pretty similar to 2024, while he also posted his lowest full-season barrel rate since his rookie year. It's hard to see Naylor keeping up this .290-plus batting average, and his previous career-high in steals was 10, so stealing 19 bases in just 54 games with the Mariners is doing a lot of heavy lifting with his fantasy value this year. He seems like a clear regression candidate, but we'll have to see where he signs.

3. Cody Bellinger (Yankees)

.272/.334/.480, 29 HR, 89 R, 98 RBI, 13 SB

Sadly, Bellinger will not be first base eligible in 2026 because he only played seven games there for the Yankees this season. However, the park was as good for him as everybody expected. Bellinger's barrel rate was only 7.5% and his 38% hard hit rate was the highest he's had since 2022, but still below most first basemen. Still, he increased his pull rate by 3% and his flyball rate by 2% and that helped lead to 29 home runs. He also made some adjustments to the pitches he was swinging at on the fringes of the strike zone, cutting his chase rate marginally but increasing his contact outside of the zone by a significant amount. That led to a solid batting average and the lowest strikeout rate of his career. All of this feels repeatable for Bellinger, but he'll just be doing it as an OF-only fantasy player.

4. Nick Kurtz (Athletics)

.290/.383/.61936 HR, 90 R, 86 RBI, 2 SB

Kurtz was the fourth overall pick in the 2024 MLB Draft and had played just 12 minor league games before the Athletics sent him to Triple-A to begin the 2025 season. It seemed like an incredibly aggressive promotion, but Kurtz responded by crushing Triple-A pitching for 20 games and forcing his way into a promotion. He didn't adjust to MLB pitching that quickly. Up until June 1st, he was hitting .245/.315/.447 with five home runs and a 33.3% strikeout rate in 28 games. It wasn't a terrible start, but it certainly didn't indicate that he would catch fire as quickly as he did. From June 1st on, Kurtz hit .304/.403/.669 with 31 home runs and 71 RBI in 89 games. Yes, he did still strike out 30% of the time, but that's always going to be a little bit a part of his game. He's still just 22 years old and will play another season in hitter-friendly Sacramento with a young and improving lineup around him. It's hard not to get excited about his future.

5. Rafael Devers (Giants)

.252/.372/.479 35 HR, 99 R, 109 RBI, 1 SB

Yes, after all that drama, Devers is now first base eligible. The veteran took issue with the way the Red Sox handled signing Alex Bregman this offseason and then had no desire to patch things up with the front office, so he was shipped out of town mid-season to San Francisco where he slowly worked himself into a role as the team's first baseman. That's a role he figures to occupy for much of the 2026 season, but the bigger question is what impact Oracle Park will have on him. Devers was somebody who went to the opposite field often in Boston, using the Green Monster to his advantage, so he struggled initially when he had to change his approach in San Francisco. Overall, Devers hit .236/.347/.460 with 20 home runs in 90 games with the Giants, striking out 29.4% of the time and pulling the ball 45% of the time, which is 8% higher than his career average. He did make tons of hard contact, but there are some questions about whether or not the 29-year-old can shift his approach so drastically and maintain his .276 career batting average while playing in San Francisco.

6.Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (Blue Jays):.292, 23 HR, 96 R, 84 RBI, 6 SB

7. Matt Olson (Braves): .272, 29 HR, 98 R, 95 RBI, 1 SB

8. Freddie Freeman (Dodgers): .295, 24 HR, 81 R, 90 RBI, 6 SB

9. Yandy Diaz (Rays): .300, 25 HR, 79 R, 83 RBI, 3 SB

10. Vinnie Pasquantino (Royals): .264, 32 HR, 72 R, 113 RBI, 1 SB

2026 Breakouts

Ben Rice (Yankees)

Matthew Pouliot covered Rice in his catcher's article, so check that out here. I will just add that, from June 1st on, Ben Rice had the third-best Process+ score in all of baseball, behind only Aaron Judge and Juan Soto. That's certainly the company you want, and the Yankees need to just give this kid at-bats.

Andrew Vaughn (Brewers)

I don't know if the Brewers are going to let Vaughn be their starting first baseman in 2026, but they should. In 64 games with Milwaukee, he hit .308/.375/.493 with nine home runs, 46 RBI, and a 14.6% strikeout rate. He had an 11.1% barrel rate and 91.7 mph average exit velocity over that span, but also put up a Process+ score of 126, when 100 is league average. From July 7th on, when Vaughn was called up by the Brewers, his Process+ score was in line with Roman Anthony, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Kyle Stowers, and Julio Rodriguez. So we have the results and we have the metrics to suggest that his approach and process support the results. I'm excited to see what a full season can bring.

Kyle Manzardo (Guardians)

With Carlos Santana out of town, Kyle Manzardo should head into the 2026 season as the everyday first baseman in Cleveland. The 25-year-old dealt with some off-season hardship this season, with his mother undergoing major surgery in the middle of the year, which also led to him missing a few games. Baseball players are human too, so that undoubtedly weighed on his mind, but Manzardo seemed to turn a corner on the field in the second half of the season. He hit .256/.338/.473 with 12 home runs and 33 RBI in 60 games to end the season. That's in line with the player we think Manzardo can be. He's just 25 years old and has an MLB career barrel rate of 11.2%, so there is plenty of quality contact being made. In a full season, could he hit .260 with 25+ home runs while batting in the middle of Cleveland's lineup? That could bring lots of fantasy value.

Troy Johnston (Marlins)

Johnston is a 28-year-old who just made his MLB debut this season, so think of this as a late-career breakout. Still, he hit .277/.331/.420 in 28 games with the Marlins with four home runs, a 9.3% barrel rate, and a 21% strikeout rate. He also stole 31 bases in 84 games at Triple-A this season and has another 24-steal campaign on his resume from back in 2023. So we have a guy with solid 15 home run power who can also steal 20 bases and hit .281 in his career in the minor leagues. Johnston also posted a solid 114 Process+ score during his time in the big leagues, which was the same as Kerry Carpenter, Bo Bichette, Ian Happ, and Vinnie Pasquantino. That means the swing decisions and contact metrics also support the results we got. Johnston is going to be 1B/OF eligible next season, and getting late shares of him seems like a solid plan.

2026 Prospects To Know

Bryce Eldridge (Giants)

Bryce Eldridge was called up by the Giants at the end of the season and struggled in his 37 MLB plate appearances; however, he showed legit power in the minors with 25 home runs in 102 games. He did have a 14.6% swinging strike rate in the minors, so swing-and-miss will always be part of his game, but the quality of contact is elite, and he posted a 95.6 mph average exit velocity in his very brief MLB sample size, but also a 95.7 mph average exit velocity in his 66 games at Triple-A. I expect Eldridge and Rafael Devers to split 1B/DH reps in San Francisco next season, and Eldridge could prove to be a great source of power.

Charlie Condon (Rockies)

We say the Rockies hate to promote their prospects, but the Rockies are also finally going to hire a general manager from outside of their organization this offseason, so maybe that all changes. Condon is the 61st-ranked prospect in baseball, according to MLB Pipeline, but is 14th on Keith Law's list. He struggled a bit in 55 games at Double-A this season, but he has impressive tools that helped make him the 3rd overall pick in the 2024 MLB Draft. He showed great contact ability in college and flashed that same ability at High-A to start the season. I expect Condon to begin 2026 at Double-A, but a hot start to the season will move him to Triple-A, at least. The Rockies have nobody really blocking him at first base, so if Condon were to get hot, they could give him a shot at big league at-bats, where his power would be tantalizing in Coors Field.

Abimelec Ortiz (Rangers)

A little bit off the radar here, but Ortiz had a great season in 2025, hitting .257/.356/.479 with 25 home runs and 89 RBU in 130 games. Oddly enough, his batting average was actually much better in his 41 games at Triple-A, hitting .283/.388/.565. The 22-year-old is only 5'10" but 230 pounds and swings the hell out of the bat. He has elite bat speed and began to make more contact as he quieted his approach. He's an average defender at first base, so he's not a DH-only, but Texas was playing Rowdy Tellez at the end of the season because Jake Burger couldn't stay healthy. With a DH spot likely opening and Joc Pederson leaving, the Rangers could keep Burger as the primary DH and give Ortiz a chance to claim reps at 1B, or the two could switch off. The upper levels of the Rangers' farm system are not deep with first base options, so if they don't make a big splash in free agency, expect Ortiz to be in the mix.

2026 Top 12 First Baseman

1. Nick Kurtz: Given his home park and the growth we saw. He has the highest upside of this group.
2. Pete Alonso: A lot is going to depend on where he ends up, but I believe in the approach shift and the consistency.
3. Matt Olson: This Braves offense is going to be better in 2026, and Olson has continued to produce.
4. Vladimir Guerrero Jr.: An elite hitter, but I think we can expect him to hit around 25 home runs, which limits his ceiling a bit at a position where you need power.
5. Freddie Freeman: Will age ever catch up with him? The team context is great, and the results have been there.
6. Rafael Devers: He's been one of the best, but what will the new park do to his batting average and power upside?
7. Bryce Harper: Are we seeing a moderate decline? Will be 33, and his batting average has fallen each of the last three years.
8. Vinnie Pasquantino: We finally saw some power come with the batting average. I'm buying into it being repeatable.
9. Josh Naylor: Where he signs will be huge. So much of his value came from those late steals. Will they return?
10. Michael Busch: Put together a great season in Chicago, and has gotten his strikeout rate under control. Power is very real.
11. Tyler Soderstrom: A bit of a rollercoaster, but the results were there. Power is great, and the home ballpark is tremendous.
12. Willson Contreras: Aging but safe. He's probably a 20 HR bat with a .260 average on a decent team, but you know you're getting his consistency.

NEW YORK — When the New York Yankees needed someone to save them, Aaron Judge practically put on a cape.

Captain clutch, indeed.

In a do-it-all effort for the ages, Judge hit a tying homer and drove in four runs as the Yankees staved off elimination by rallying past the Toronto Blue Jays 9-6 in Game 3 of their AL Division Series.

“Just an awesome, MVP-like performance,” New York manager Aaron Boone said. “A pretty incredible night for the captain.”

Judge went 3 for 4 with an intentional walk and scored three times, also making pivotal plays with his glove and legs as Yankee Stadium fans chanted “MVP! MVP!”

Down by five early, New York scored eight unanswered runs to prevent a three-game sweep and push the best-of-five playoff series to Game 4 in the Bronx.

“Hopefully he gets a bad night’s sleep and has some bad food tonight or something like that,” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said.

After struggling at the plate in previous postseasons, Judge is 7 for 11 in this series (.636) with five RBIs and three walks.

That makes him 11 for 22 (.500) with six RBIs, five runs and a 1.304 OPS in six playoff games this year as the two-time AL MVP and seven-time All-Star chases his first World Series ring at 33 years old.

Long way to go this October. But if not for Judge and 6 2/3 scoreless innings from the New York bullpen, the season already would be over.

“Tonight was special, but there’s still more work to be done,” he said. “Hopefully we have some more cool moments like this the rest of the postseason.”

Jazz Chisholm Jr. launched a go-ahead solo homer in the fifth, and New York improved to 3-0 in elimination games during these playoffs with the franchise’s largest comeback ever in those situations.

The only time the Yankees overcame a bigger deficit in the postseason was when they climbed out of a 6-0 hole in Game 4 of the 1996 World Series at Atlanta.

Toronto, which committed a couple of costly errors that led to a pair of unearned runs, hadn’t lost all season when leading by at least four.

With the Yankees trailing 6-1, consecutive doubles by Trent Grisham and Judge to start the third began the comeback. Later in the inning, Judge stayed in a rundown between third base and home plate long enough to allow Cody Bellinger to reach third. That became important when Bellinger scored on Giancarlo Stanton’s sacrifice fly.

New York was still down 6-3 in the fourth with two runners aboard when right-hander Louis Varland was brought in to face Judge, who sought out Stanton in the dugout for a scouting report.

Varland struck out Stanton in a key spot during Game 1.

“Big G saw him in Toronto. I asked him, I hadn’t seen Louis since he was with the Twins and was a starter. I wanted a brush up. I’ve seen all the videos, seen all the appearances, but it’s a difference when you step in the box and see him live. So I was talking to him about what certain pitches were like, what it felt like,” Judge said.

“Any info you can get like that kind of helps you sharpen your game plan a little bit and kind of gets you locked in a little bit better.”

Judge turned on an 0-2 fastball clocked at 100 mph off the inside corner and somehow kept it fair, launching a three-run drive that clanged high off the left-field foul pole for his 17th postseason homer.

“I guess a couple ghosts out there helped kind of keep that fair,” he said.

Schneider called it “a ridiculous swing.”

“He made a really good pitch look really bad,” Varland said.

Judge tossed his bat aside and gestured to teammates on the bench as the sellout crowd of 47,399 burst into a frenzy.

“It’s an amazing swing,” Boone said. “That’s shades of Edgar Martínez right there, taking that high-and-tight one and keeping it fair down the line. Manny Ramirez used to do that really well, too. But just a great swing on a pretty nasty pitch, obviously.”

At 99.7 mph, it was the fastest pitch Judge has ever homered on. And it was the first home run by any big leaguer on a pitch 99 mph or faster 1.2 feet inside from the center of the strike zone since pitch tracking started in 2008, according to MLB Statcast.

“I don’t know. I get yelled at for swinging at them out of the zone, but now I’m getting praised for it,” said Judge, who also went deep against Varland in the pitcher’s major league debut with Minnesota in September 2022. “I don’t care what the numbers say or where something was at, I’m just up there trying to put a good swing on a good pitch, and it looked good to me.

“After he blew my doors off on the pitch before, I said just get ready, see a good pitch, and drive it.”

The right fielder then made a diving catch with a runner at second in the fifth, drawing more “MVP” chants.

And in the sixth, Judge scored on Ben Rice’s sacrifice fly after being intentionally walked with one out and nobody on base.

Call it a sign of respect. Or perhaps, fear.

“He’s had a good postseason. He’s had a pretty good career,” Schneider said. “There’s times where you just don’t want him to swing.”

NEW YORK — Up five runs, the Toronto Blue Jays were headed to a three-game sweep of the New York Yankees and their first trip to the AL Championship Series in nine years.

And then it slipped out of their gloves.

A pair of errors by Isiah Kiner-Falefa and Addison Barger revived the Yankees, who then rode home runs by Aaron Judge and Jazz Chisholm Jr. off Louis Varland to a 9-6 victory.

“Sloppy brand of baseball,” Kiner-Falefa said.

Instead of preparing to host Seattle or Detroit at Rogers Centre this weekend, the Blue Jays’ lead in the best-of-five series was cut to 2-1 heading into Game 4 at Yankee Stadium.

“You’re talking about giving a really good team extra outs.” Blue Jays manager John Schneider said. “Walks and errors will kill you against this team.”

Varland gave up a homer to Judge while making his major league debut for Minnesota on Sept. 7, 2022. This one was a three-run drive that tied the score 6-6 in the fourth.

Judge’s homer was the first on a 99 mph or faster pitch 1.2 feet inside from the center of the strike zone since pitch tracking started in 2008, according to MLB Statcast.

“He made a really good pitch look really bad,” said Varland, who will start Game 4 as an opener.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hit a two-run, first-inning homer off Carlos Rodón and is batting .693 (8 for 13) with three homers and eight RBIs in the series. The Blue Jays lost after leading by five runs for the first time since Sept. 3, 2024, against Philadelphia, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

“Flush it tonight. That’s all you can do, and bounce back tomorrow and come out and win a series,” said Toronto starter Shane Bieber, who lasted just 2 2/3 innings.

Kiner-Falefa, a 2020 Gold Glove winner at third, allowed Ben Rice’s two-out grounder in the bottom of the first to kick off the heel of his glove. The ball bounced off his chest and fell to the dirt, and Kiner-Falefa inadvertently kicked it as Rice reached. Giancarlo Stanton followed with an RBI single that cut the lead in half.

“Big error by me right there,” Kiner-Falefa said. “It just took a high hop. I was expecting a lower-hit ball. I felt like I did a good job knocking it down, just wasn’t able to stop the spin on the ground.”

With the Blue Jays ahead 6-3 in the fourth, one out and no one on, Austin Wells lofted a pop to left. Third baseman Barger, who had entered as a pinch hitter in the third, settled under the ball in short left only for the wind to blow the ball toward the seats. The ball hit off his glove and bounced into foul territory as Wells reached second.

“The wind was kind of weird all night. You could see early on that it was kind of swirling up top,” Barger said. “I thought I was camped under it.”

Trent Grisham walked, and Varland relieved and got ahead of Judge 0-2. The 27-year-old right-hander, acquired from the Twins at the trade deadline, threw a 99.7 mph fastball that the two-time AL MVP drove high down the left-field line.

Varland craned his neck, tried to wish the ball foul and watched it clang high off the foul pole. Judge made a rare bat flip.

“I guess a couple ghosts out there helped kind of keep that fair,” Judge said.

Then in the fifth, Varland left a 99.4 mph fastball low and inside for Chisholm, rarely a good pitch to a left-handed hitter in Yankee Stadium. Varland crouched and bowed his head even before Chisholm’s no-doubt drive bounced out of the second deck in right for a 7-6 lead.

Anthony Santander, in an image fitting of Toronto’s night, was prone in right, face in the grass, after he failed to come up with a backhand catch on Cody Bellinger’s liner in the sixth, which bounced to the warning track for a double.

In a quiet Blue Jays clubhouse after midnight, players looked ahead to Game 4 and another chance to close out the series and avoid a Game 5 in Toronto.

“Hopefully do what we did the first two games,” Kiner-Falefa said, “and if it doesn’t work out, we get to go home.”

DETROIT — The Detroit Tigers have less than 24 hours to find an offense that can save their season.

Unfortunately for their chances in the American League Division Series, the Tigers have been looking for the last month without any success.

Detroit only managed one run on five hits in the first eight innings of their 8-4 loss to the Seattle Mariners, leaving them down 2-1 in the series and facing elimination.

“Tonight wasn’t easy,” Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said. “Especially with what (Logan) Gilbert was throwing up there. Not many fastballs and a lot of sliders and splits. We were swinging more and more as the game went on, and we had trouble putting together back-to-back at-bats that were productive.”

Gilbert allowed one run on four hits in six innings, striking out seven without issuing a walk.

“That was vintage Logan,” Mariners manager Dan Wilson said. “He attacked the zone, he got into good counts and he let the split and the slider do his work for him.”

The Tigers scored three runs off Caleb Ferguson in the ninth to narrow the margin to four runs, but Wilson brought in closer Andrés Muñoz. He only needed to face two batters, getting a flyout and a game-ending double play.

“We’re facing really good arms and we haven’t strung together as many great at-bats as we would like,” Tigers leadoff hitter Kerry Carpenter said. “We have to tip our hat to some great pitching. We’ve got at least one more game to turn it around.”

That’s easier said than done for a team that is averaging fewer than three runs a game in the last four weeks.

The problems started with 16 games left in the regular season. On Sept. 11, having outscored the Yankees 23-3 in the previous two days, the Tigers lost 9-3.

They went 3-13 down the stretch, blowing what seemed like a safe AL Central lead to the Cleveland Guardians and only getting the final wild-card berth on a tiebreaker over the Houston Astros.

Things haven’t changed in October. The Tigers hit .218 in the AL Wild Card Series against the Guardians, scoring nine runs in three games but getting out of the series when Cleveland hit .178.

They only scored six runs in the first 28 innings against the Mariners before the meaningless late rally in Game 3.

“This is the hardest time of the year to hit,” Hinch said. “When you are facing high-end pitching in October, it is a grind. Obviously, their guys are talented and are exposing a little bit of the zone control we talk about all the time.”

The Tigers have struck out 68 times in six postseason games, and eight of their nine everyday hitters are averaging at least one strikeout a game.

That’s been a problem all year, though.

Riley Greene and Spencer Torkelson, Detroit’s most dangerous hitters, have struck out 385 times between the regular season and playoffs. In the regular season, they combined for 67 homers and 189 RBIs, but they haven’t homered in the postseason and Torkelson has six of their seven RBIs.

The Tigers are starting to look timid at the plate. In the eighth inning, desperately needing a rally, Javier Báez and Carpenter took five straight strikes from Eduard Bazardo before Carpenter weakly waved at a third strike.

Bryce Miller, who went 4-6 with a 5.68 ERA in 18 starts, will be on the mound for Seattle. If the Tigers can’t take advantage of him, a once-promising season might be over.