Welcome to Opening Week! We’re just under 48 hours away from the first pitch of the 2026 MLB regular season. I’m a tad tardy on getting our season preview articles started as I’ve been spending more time than I had hoped cleaning up a few issues with the new site. But hopefully I’ll be able to get through at least half of the team previews before the season officially begins.
As I believe I suggested I might do during these previews last year, I’ve decided to make a change in the projection system I’m using to compute these projected stats and standings. For years, I’ve been using FanGraphs’ Depth Chart projections, which combine Steamer and ZiPS and then adjust for playing time expectations on a per team basis. It’s that last part that was starting to bother me a little bit as I have felt they are far too optimistic in *not* projecting missed time for players who are rarely able to make it through a full season without spending time on the IL. Adjusting the plate appearance or innings pitched numbers really paints a different picture than the source projection systems intended. So I’ve decided to go with a different source which also combines multiple freely available projection systems, but does so in a way that makes more sense to me and tends to have a better predictive track record.
Staring this year, I am going to use the ATC projection system, created by Ariel Cohen and also available on FanGraphs. ATC utilizes a whole bunch of other freely available projection systems, including Steamer and ZiPS. It weights each of the systems it uses based on their historical strengths and weaknesses in various categories. So essentially it becomes a “best of the best” compilation of all these systems.
I grabbed the ATC 2026 projections for all players just a few days before our draft started and updated my spreadsheet throughout the draft to leave as little work as possible to be done after the draft completed. So if there was any new information such as injuries that could have popped up these past few weeks, these numbers don’t reflect that. The one exception I made was to completely remove Jurickson Profar from the Darkhorses projections since his full season PED suspension was recently upheld. Interestingly, this very slightly improved the Darkhorses final projections across the batting categories.
The usual caveats remain. I’m not attempting to make any individual team roster composition guesses, so all 28 players who were on your roster at the conclusion of the draft are fed into this with their full season projections. Then each teams’ totals are scaled to meet a certain plate appearance and innings pitched target. Position slots are not considered at all, so the fact that the Demigods are currently the only team with three catchers on their roster probably does ding their batting numbers relative to other teams even though they likely won’t use more than two catchers at any time this year. So just something to keep in mind.
Now let’s get to it. As usual, I’m grouping these articles based on teams that are projected to finish near one another in the standings, and am planning on going back to a four part series after doing just three last year. So we’re starting with the two teams that are expected to finish in the bottom two spots in the standings according to these numbers. Notably, last year’s last place finisher is not among them. Also notable that last year’s projected tenth place finisher actually finished five spots higher than that. So keep in mind that the point of this exercise is to peek at each team’s relative strengths and weaknesses more so than trying to predict the actual order of finish.
Jay’s Jackalope
Category – Projected Rank (2025 Rank)
- Batting Average – 8th (3rd)
- Home Runs – 7th (4th)
- Runs Batted In – 8th (7th)
- Runs Scored – 5th (7th-T)
- Stolen Bases – 4th (6th)
- Earned Run Average – 9th (7th)
- WHIP Ratio – 9th (7th)
- Wins – 10th (9th-T)
- Saves – 10th (8th-T)
- Strike Outs – 7th (9th)
- Total Batting Points – 7th-T (4th)
- Total Pitching Points – 10th (9th)
- Total Points – 10th (8th)
Summary:
After a disappointing 8th place finish last year, the Jackalope decided it was time for a reboot and went with an extreme youth movement in this month’s draft. Each of their first six draft picks were used on players who made their MLB debut in 2025. So with such small big league sample sizes also comes volatility in the projections. With little to no track record on these guys, projection systems unsurprisingly temper expectations. Of those first six picks, only the first and second rounders, outfielder Roman Anthony and starting pitcher Chase Burns have positive PAR projections. They are clearly the stars of this group. Anthony joins an outfield that is by far the best position group of this roster. Ronald Acuna Jr, Jackson Chourio, Pete Crow-Armstrong and Michael Harris are All-Star caliber players. And of course they have all-world catcher Cal Raleigh back too. It’s the infield where these numbers point to the Jackalope being well below average. Jeremy Pena and Dansby Swanson do give them a solid pair of shortstops though. To exceed these projections, the Jackalope will need at least one of the three young infielders they took with consecutive picks in rounds three through five, Colson Montgomery, Matt Shaw and Marcelo Mayer, to really break out this season. The Jakalope’s disappointing season a year ago was mostly because of the pitching staff. It doesn’t look like this year will be much different in that regard. Burns has exciting potential, but the rest of the rotation consists of veterans past their prime or extremely injury prone hurlers. Getting Gerrit Cole back will be huge boost if he’s able to return to his pre-Tommy John form. Luis Castillo has been the constant in the Jackalope staff for years now, but is clearly not the dominant ace he once was. Bubba Chandler is the other youngster besides Burns who they will turn to if the vets continue to decline or get hurt again. The bullpen looks like what you might expect from a rebuilding team with only Raisel Iglesias firmly entrenched as a closer for his MLB squad. Bryan Abreu has sneaky upside though if Josh Hader misses significant time in Houston. The Jackalope are relying on so many youngsters that it makes it nearly impossible to predict how this will go in the short term. The good news is that when you take that many shots, your chances of a couple big hits increases. That’s exactly what the Jackalope will be hoping for in 2026.
Kelly’s Cougars
Category – Projected Rank (2025 Rank)
- Batting Average – 3rd (5th)
- Home Runs – 10th (10th)
- Runs Batted In – 10th (10th)
- Runs Scored – 10th (10th)
- Stolen Bases – 8th (10th)
- Earned Run Average – 4th (2nd)
- WHIP Ratio – 3rd (2nd)
- Wins – 9th (8th)
- Saves – 8th (10th)
- Strike Outs – 6th (7th)
- Total Batting Points – 10th (10th)
- Total Pitching Points – 8th (6th)
- Total Points – 9th (9th)
Summary:
This is exactly where the Cougars were projected to finish a year ago, and it turned out to be almost exactly correct not only in the place of finish, but where they would rank in most of the categories as well. The Cougars will hope that these projections aren’t quite as accurate this time around. The pitching staff was much improved last year, so the hope is that their offense can take similar steps in the right direction in this year’s campaign, even though it is not predicted to happen here. They took a more conservative approach to their offensive rebuild than the Jacklope, going with more proven commodities like Taylor Ward and Luis Arraez in the first half of the draft. Even first round pick Geraldo Perdomo was more of a substance over style pick. Perdomo joins a crowded middle infield, but he and Ketel Marte are the clear headliners. They return the Marlins double play combo of Xavier Edwards and Otto Lopez. Maybe the biggest key for the Cougars offense to improve would be a full healthy season from second baseman Matt McLain. It will be interesting to see which of these guys get a bulk of the time at middle infield for the Cougars. They had to completely rebuild the corner spots with Tyler Soderstrom moving to the outfield. Arraez and Caleb Durbin were key additions for those spots. One clear strength is behind the dish with returners Salvador Perez and Shea Langeliers, who are both among the top catchers in fantasy baseball. The outfield is filled with steady veterans like Ward, Bryan Reynolds and underappreciated star Brent Rooker. Rooker actually has the highest projected Batting PAR on this entire roster. The pitching staff looks solid once again, with more or less the entire starting rotation in tact from last year led by reigning NL Cy Young award winner Paul Skenes. Joe Ryan, Nick Pivetta and Kevin Gausman also return and each of them have solid projections for this year too. The one newcomer is another veteran, second round pick Brandon Woodruff, who looks to put a couple injury plagued seasons behind him. The bullpen is a wild card here. Ryan Walker is the only safe bet to rack up saves, but Griffin Jax and Abner Uribe are two others with hopes of earning saves and solid projections in the other categories to go with it. The Cougars should have another solid pitching staff this season. The key to moving up in the standings will be for some of the bats to exceed these projections, with several strong candidates to do so in the middle infield group.
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