Who Has the Most to Prove This MLB Season?
From contenders to pretenders, and everyone in between, 2026 is a prove-it year across baseball.
The 2026 MLB season — which officially starts Wednesday night with Yankees-Giants on Netflix (!) — figures to look a lot like the one we just watched conclude back in October.
The two-time defending champion L.A. Dodgers once again project as the league’s most complete team, while recent ALCS participants like the Blue Jays, Mariners and Yankees remain clustered near the top of the World Series odds as well. Shohei Ohtani is favored to win NL MVP for a fourth straight year — potentially joining Barry Bonds as the only player ever to do that — and a fifth time overall. (If that happens, maybe they should just rename the hardware again and call it the Ohtani Award.)
But if the favorites are largely unchanged, the storylines around them are anything but. Just beneath that familiar surface sits a long list of teams and stars with a lot to prove — whether due to unfinished business, unmet expectations, or a creeping sense that time is running out on them. What follows are the faces and franchises entering 2026 with the most on the line.
⚾ But first, a note of updating/correcting some data: Loyal readers will know I crunched the numbers last week on teams who added/subtracted the most net projected Wins Above Replacement (WAR) value1 over the winter, using FanGraphs’ offseason tracker. However, I later discovered that their list of subtractions did not include players who were traded away or otherwise directly acquired by another team (via waivers, the Rule V draft, etc.). So we were missing a sizable chunk of players who switched teams this offseason!
I love FanGraphs and this is ultimately on me for not checking the data more closely — sorry about that. See below for the updated chart, and I’ll add a note to the previous story redirecting people to this page for the corrected data!
Anyway, back to the rundown of teams under pressure this season:
⚾ Baltimore Orioles
When I ran (and re-ran) those net offseason WAR numbers, the Orioles showed up as an easy No. 1. Their lineup picked up three new members — 1B Pete Alonso, LF Taylor Ward and 2B Blaze Alexander — and they added two new starting pitchers — Shane Baz and Chris Bassitt — plus closer Ryan Helsley, while losing only one player (SP Grayson Rodriguez) projected for more than 1 WAR.
