Fantasy Baseball All-Bust Team - Mike's Most Disappointing Players (2026)

October 10, 2026

Mike gives you his top fantasy baseball busts. His biggest busts for hitters and pitchers in Fantasy Baseball for the 2026 season, including Julio Rodriguez, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., and Kyle Tucker and more.

We tend to focus in the fantasy baseball community on players that we guessed right on and take victory laps on those guys. Players like Miguel Vargas. We tend to spend less time discussing those players we took at a high cost who turned into busts this season. Cal Raleigh, come on down.

What constitutes a bust? We spotlighted players drafted in the top 150 who finished well below their ADP on the FanGraphs Player Rater. These are players you relied on who massively underperformed their draft position. 

We are excluding players who were disappointing based on injury or missed time (e.g., Garrett Crochet), and most of those who were sent down to the minors (e.g., Dylan Crews, Agustin Ramirez). Let's examine players we rated incorrectly in 2026. 

The Biggest Fantasy Baseball of 2026

Julio Rodriguez, OF, Seattle Mariners (ADP 9.5)

I have always felt that the first-round price on Rodriguez is too high for the potential volatility you inherit when you roster him. In 2026, Rodriguez produced a .247 batting average with 22 home runs, 22 stolen bases, and 69 runs scored. A down year for sure.

In 2025, he hit .267 with 32 home runs, 30 stolen bases, and 106 runs scored. His OPS dropped from .798 in 2025 to .708 in 2026. Rodriguez had the lowest barrel percentage at 8.8% and hard-hit rate at 43.7% of his career.

He is still only 25 and coming off his fifth season, but what kind of value can we bank on for Rodriguez moving forward?  Hard to say for me, but it will not be a first-round pick for me in 2027. The underlying metrics show that his quality of contact and power numbers regressed. See below.

Someone in my leagues will draft Rodriguez earlier than I will, with the hopes he can get back to those .260 and 30/30 numbers as a high draft pick. He is still young and could return to that superstar status. The Mariners need him to do that; a down year in 2026 can be largely pinned on his struggles.

Kyle Tucker, OF, Los Angeles Dodgers (ADP 13.1)

Tucker was signed to be the missing piece in a Los Angeles juggernaut, an expensive addition for a team that is World Series win or bust. Instead of producing a great season, Tucker has lapses and issues that led to a .233 batting average, with 17 homers, 70 RBI, 12 stolen bases, and 90 runs.

At 29, he should be at his peak performance, but that did not happen in 2026. To Tucker's credit, he did put together a fine September: a .262 batting average, six homers, 13 RBI, three stolen bases, and 19 runs scored. Maybe that is a precursor to an improved 2027 season for him.

See below, and look at the drop in his barrel percentage this year. Now, he did look better at the end of the season, and with a huge contract in tow, we know that Tucker will see full-time at-bats in 2027. He should bounce back into a 20/20 player, but expecting 30/30 seems farcical.

Cal Raleigh, C, Seattle Mariners (ADP 18.7)

Has there ever been a steeper decline from fantasy grace into despair as we witnessed with the Big Dumper this season? Go ahead and discuss all winter. Raleigh won many leagues for players in 2025 with an absurd season: .247 batting average, 60 home runs, 125 RBI, 14 stolen bases, and 110 runs.

This year, he cratered in the first half, hitting an illogical .169 with nine homers and 29 RBI. He rebounded a bit in the second half to hit .196 with 14 homers and 40 RBI. Still, there is no way to sugarcoat it: he had a terrible season.

See his Statcast box below. The batting average and on-base percentage dropped 60 points from last year. While not necessarily valuable to fantasy players, his defensive metrics frowned on his work in 2026 as well. A 30.6% K% and trouble chasing pitches are evident here as well.

We learned this week that Raleigh ended up needing a shoulder debridement procedure on his left AC joint immediately at season's end. Raleigh also battled through an oblique injury. Still, it was a down year for the slugger in 2026. Both injuries could have hurt his ability to be productive.

Moving forward, the data does not suggest that Raleigh will approach 60 home runs ever again, but with health and a winter to rest and work, he could easily get back to 30 home runs with a .225 batting average in 2027. I am not sure I will be taking that risk unless it is cost-effective for me.

Vladimir Guerrero Jr., 1B, Toronto Blue Jays (ADP 18.1)

Guerrero is frequently selected near the back of the first round of most fantasy drafts. If you did that this year, your team may have floundered. Armed with a half billion dollars in contracted money, Guerrero hit a disappointing .260 with nine home runs, 57 RBI, seven stolen bases, and 72 runs.

Look at the Statcast data below. His barrel percentage dropped to 6.9%, his exit velocity fell to 90.3, and his hard-hit percentage was 44.3%. All are career lows for the veteran with the exception of his age-20 season.

In better news, his strikeout percentage remained among the league's best at 13.3%, his bat speed remains elite at 76.3 MPH, and his xBA was .280. That is all good news, but the precipitous power drop-off and reduced batting average were alarming given his high cost of acquisition in most leagues.

Can he bounce back? I would suggest yes; a balky back seemed to trouble him more than he let on this season, and it would not surprise me if we learn he has some procedure to clean that up. He did have a laser surgery on his eyes last week. Still, I will probably look at other options at first base this winter.

Christian Yelich, DH, Milwaukee Brewers (ADP 127.2)

Yelich is on the gentle slope of the downside of his career, but many fantasy players hoped for a repeat of last season. They did not get that season, unfortunately. In 2025, Yelich hit .264 with 29 home runs, 103 RBI, 16 stolen bases, and 88 runs in his age-33 season.

In 2026, those numbers slipped to .235 with 12 home runs, 59 RBI, 11 stolen bases, and 69 runs while playing 32 fewer games and knocking 144 plate appearances off his ledger. Yelich is also only eligible at the utility position in most leagues, making him less useful these days.

A career-worst exit velocity this season (shown below) is a primary culprit, while his strikeout percentage inched up to 27%, the second worst of his career. Yelich can likely be counted on for double-digit home runs and steals next year, but do not expect much help in other categories.

Logan Webb, SP, San Francisco Giants (ADP 57.2)

Webb has been a fantasy darling for nearly a decade, posting decent win totals with sparkling ratios and high strikeout numbers. That changed in 2026, with eight wins, a career-high 4.31 ERA, a good 1.17 WHIP, and 134 strikeouts in 160 innings- 40 fewer innings and 90 fewer strikeouts than 2025. Egads.

His strikeout totals were always tied to the number of innings he pitched, making him a volume play in those categories. He walked only 6.1% of hitters, and his ground-ball percentage remained elite at 51.8%. So what was the difference in 2026? He cratered in the second half with a 5.07 ERA.

The Giants decided to shut Webb down in mid-September with a finger blister, and he missed a few starts with knee bursitis in May. He was an All-Star in July, but seemed to run out of gas down the stretch. At 29, he could still have some good seasons left and rebound in 2027.

Looking at the graphic below, I am interested in the pitch mix change shown below. He reduced the usage of his sinker and sweeper while increasing fastball usage. He was using the sinker as more of a backdoor pitch to right-handed hitters. How will he attack in 2027?

I am thinking a small bounceback could be in order, but to expect Webb to be a "1B" type of ace as he has been over the years due to a volume play seems foolhardy at this point. There will be other pitchers in his range that I will have more interest in acquiring with more upside.

Framber Valdez, P, Detroit Tigers (ADP 81.1)

Valdez was paid to be the ace of the Detroit Tigers this past offseason, and it did not work out at all. Detroit signed Valdez to a long-term deal last offseason, but he struggled to his worst full season as a starter: 10 wins, a 4.03 ERA, a 1.36 WHIP, and 135 strikeouts in 174 innings.

There were some alarming trends for a pitcher rostered to be a second-tier staff ace; his strikeout rate dropped to 17.7% while surrendering 78 earned runs, among the 10 worst in the American League. Of interest to me, Valdez was throwing his curveball less this season until September.

In September, Valdez looked more like himself, starting four games and earning a 1.93 ERA while winning two games. A simple adjustment he made to move to the middle of the rubber, combined with a return to using his curveball with better location, could help him find it again.

Valdez looks like he could be in line for a subtle pitch mix change next season. Nothing much in the underlying metrics really changed for him, but he needs that curveball working for him to return to his previous lofty standards.

I hope you enjoyed this article, and I know we could have talked about a dozen other players. More are listed below here. Have a great offseason and enjoy the playoff baseball at this point, but remember, preparation will be key to righting the wrongs of last season on your squads.

Other Fantasy Baseball Busts

• Gunnar Henderson (ADP 12.5)
• Ketel Marte (ADP 32.6)
• Hunter Brown (ADP 36.2)
• Andres Munoz (ADP 41.2)
• Austin Riley (ADP 59.4)
• Jarren Duran (ADP 64)
• George Kirby (ADP 64.4)
• Kyle Bradish (ADP 73)
• George Springer (ADP 94.4)
• Jose Altuve (ADP 116)

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