Corey Pieper | Fri, Mar 20th 2026, 7:10am EDT

Top 10 Fantasy Baseball Rookies (2026)

Rostering rookies in fantasy baseball is a roll of the dice. Sometimes you can hit it big, but other times you crap out completely.

In the last few seasons, we’ve seen some truly remarkable rookie performances. Nick Kurtz hit the ground with a historic pace last season. It helped him to pass up his teammate, Jacob Wilson, who finished second to only Aaron Judge in batting average.

Who can forget the historic 2024 National League group of rookies? Paul Skenes made his debut in the midseason and dominated instantly (never really stopped) to win the National League Rookie of the Year award. That helped him to overcome the Jackson duo of Merrill and Chourio.

For all those success stories, there are plenty of rookies who never developed. Roki Sasaki, Matt Shaw, Jordan Lawlar, Jasson Dominguez, and Jackson Jobe were all drafted in most fantasy baseball leagues last season. None of them delivered anything close to what was expected. That’s the risk that fantasy managers take when selecting rookies.

With that in mind, the Top 10 Fantasy Baseball Rookies are below. It’s a mix of players coming from Asia, some players that we saw in spurts last season, and some that will likely debut in 2026.

Fantasy Baseball Rookies | Top-10 Rankings (2026)

Carson Benge (OF – NYM)

Carson Benge should be in the Mets’ Opening Day lineup in the outfield.

Benge was selected in the first round of the 2024 MLB draft as a two-way player coming out of Oklahoma State. He has since dropped pitching to focus on his time in the outfield. It was a wise choice because he has sped through the minor leagues. Last season, he progressed all the way from High A to Triple A by the end of the season. While there were some struggles at Triple A, he still finished his season with 87 runs, 15 home runs, 73 RBI, 22 stolen bases, with a .281 batting average and .385 on-base percentage.

Munetaka Murakami (1B – CWS)

Coming from Japan is the power-hitting Munetaka Murakami.

Murakami missed a significant amount of time in his final season in Japan with an oblique injury. He played in only 69 games, finishing with 40 runs, 24 home runs, 52 RBI, five stolen bases, and a .286 batting average. Because of the injury, each of his counting stats was the worst he has posted since his rookie season way back in 2018. Even though he has been playing professionally for eight seasons, he is still just 26 years old. His biggest challenge is going to be too many strikeouts, leading to a poor batting average.

Kazuma Okamoto (3B – TOR)

Another power-hitting corner infielder coming from Japan is Kazuma Okamoto.

Okamoto is coming a bit later in his career than Murakami, as he will turn 30 in the middle of the season. Similarly to Murakami, he missed time last season with an injury, but his was to his elbow. Before last season’s shortened season, he had seven straight seasons of at least 27 home runs and over 80 RBI. The batting average concern isn’t as great with him as he has only one season with a strikeout rate over 20 percent in the Japanese League.

Carter Jensen (C – KC)

Carter Jensen debuted last season with some elite power-hitting metrics.

Jensen only played in 20 Major League games last season, but half of his 18 hits were extra-base hits, including three home runs. While the surface stats were impressive, it’s the underlying data that gets exciting. If you drop the qualifications down to 25 batted ball events, only Oneil Cruz and Aaron Judge had a higher average exit velocity. He was also top-five in hard hit rate behind sluggers like Roman Anthony, Kyle Schwarber, and Shohei Ohtani.

JJ Wetherholt (2B/SS – STL)

A trade of Brendan Donovan opens second base for JJ Wetherholt in the Cardinals’ lineup.

Based on what he has shown in the minor leagues, Wetherholt is likely to hit the ground running. He played at both Double A and Triple A last season and never showed any signs of struggle at either level, batting over .300 at both. In total, he finished with 82 runs, 17 home runs, 59 RBI, 23 stolen bases, and a .306 batting average. He walked nearly as much as he struck out, which should boost his value even further in on-base percentage leagues.

Kevin McGonigle (SS/2B – DET)

You can rarely call a prospect safe, but that’s the case with Kevin McGonigle.

One way to be considered safe among prospects is to walk at a high rate while avoiding strikeouts. McGonigle has done that consistently at every stop in his minor league career. Last season, he struck out only 11.6 percent of the time while walking 14.9 percent. That helped him post his third consecutive season with a batting average over .300 and an on-base percentage over .400. Second base in Detroit is blocked by Gleyber Torres, but shortstop is ripe for the taking from Zach McKinstry.

Konnor Griffin (SS – PIT)

The unanimous top prospect in the game is Konnor Griffin.

There are rumors of a contract extension between Griffin and the Pirates. If that happens, he will be the Opening Day shortstop for the Pittsburgh Pirates. If the extension doesn’t happen, fantasy managers will be in limbo waiting for his inevitable call-up. When that does happen, Griffin is likely to hit the ground running. As a teenager in his first professional season, he had 117 runs, 21 home runs, 94 RBI, 65 stolen bases, and batted .333 with a .415 on-base percentage. Those are the types of numbers that have fantasy managers salivating for his future.

Tatsuya Imai (SP – HOU)

The premier Asian pitcher to make the transition to Major League Baseball this offseason is Tatsuya Imai.

Imai signed a three-year contract with the Astros for $54 million. It was quite a bit less than what was anticipated earlier in the offseason. His final season in Japan included a 1.92 ERA, 0.89 WHIP, and 178 strikeouts over 163 innings. My personal favorite way to compare Asian pitchers coming to MLB is to look at ERA-, which is standardized to 100 for the league. His last season was a 64. For comparison purposes, Yoshinobu Yamamoto’s last season was a 39, and Kodai Senga’s was a 61.

Trey Yesavage (SP – TOR)

Trey Yesavage showed his immense upside during the Blue Jays’ World Series run.

Yesavage made three starts at the end of September last season. Two of three starts were fine, but it’s really two of his postseason starts that have fantasy managers excited. His postseason included 11 strikeouts over five innings against the Yankees. In Game 5 of the World Series, he struck out 12 Dodgers in seven innings. Not every postseason appearance was at that level, but those seem to have stuck with drafters as he is going inside the top 150 on average per FantasyPros ADP.

Nolan McLean (SP – NYM)

Still technically rookie-eligible, Nolan McLean is going off the board as a top-30 starting pitcher according to FantasyPros ADP.

McLean already has 48 big league innings, so he’s likely to lose his eligibility in his first start of the season. Those 48 innings came with 57 strikeouts, a 2.06 ERA, and 1.o4 WHIP. It wasn’t that he was getting lucky either, as he had a 2.97 FIP and 3.56 xERA. Considering he peaked last season at 113 innings, the question will be how many innings he is able to pitch this season. When he is out there, I expect him to be very effective.

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