2025-26 MLB Free Agent Power Rankings

We’re just over one-third of the way through the 2025 regular season, and it’s been about six weeks since MLBTR’s initial ranking of the upcoming members of the 2025-26 MLB free agent class. It’s a good time for a refresh, although many of the same names will populate the list (albeit in a different order). There are two new entrants, however, and the bottom of the list has shuffled around particularly.

As a reminder, our power rankings at MLB Trade Rumors are not a straight ranking of the best free agents in the upcoming class. There are plenty of older veterans who can make significant impact on short-term deals. However, our rankings are based on total earning power, which means older vets like Paul Goldschmidt are rarely going to crack the top 10, regardless of how strong their performance is. Their age will simply limit them to a shorter-term pact that caps their earning power and leaves them with smaller guarantees than less-productive (but still quality) contributors who can more plausibly push for a long-term deal.

As we’ve seen with recent mega-deals for Juan Soto and Vladimir Guerrero Jr., age is king when it comes to unlocking the richest deals MLB has to offer. The best way a player can position himself for a monster contract is to get to free agency at as young an age as possible — and, of course, do so while turning in excellent results at the plate or on the mound.

One notable and somewhat enigmatic name that’s dropped off our list entirely, for now, is NPB slugger Munetaka Murakami. The 25-year-old corner infielder has played in only one game so far in 2025 due to an oblique strain. Reports dating all the way back to Dec. 2022 indicated that Murakami would be posted following the 2025 season. At the time, he was fresh off a 56-homer MVP campaign, wherein he hit .318/.458/.710 as a 22-year-old. The sky is the limit for that blend of power production and youth. Murakami’s numbers slipped in 2023-24, however. He still popped a combined 64 homers but did so with mounting strikeout rates and increasing struggles against higher-end velocity. Now with an injury that’s sidelined him effectively all season and minimal clarity as to a potential return date — or even whether he still plans to pursue MLB opportunities this winter — he’s been dropped to our honorable mention section. If Murakami returns in June and bashes 20 to 30 homers with strong rate stats over the final few months of the NPB season, he’ll jump right back onto this list — probably onto the top half. For now, he’s something of an unknown, and we’re choosing to focus on more known commodities with a surefire path to the open market.

Onto the updated rankings!

1. Kyle Tucker, OF, Cubs

Stats since last edition: .268/.365/.479, seven home runs, 12 steals, 13.8 BB%, 12 K%

No change here. Tucker fell into a brief slump in mid-May where he tallied just six hits in 11 games, but broke out of that funk with consecutive three-hit games that included a home run. The 28-year-old Tucker is batting .281/.388/.525 with a dozen homers and 15 stolen bases at the one-third mark of the Cubs’ season. He’s on pace for about 35 homers and 45 steals — all while walking more than he’s struck out (15.1% versus 12%) — and is also on pace to top the century mark in both runs and RBIs.

The only possible dings on Tucker’s season so far is that defensive metrics like DRS and OAA both feel he’s been a bit below average. You could point out that he’s not playing at quite as torrid a pace last year in terms of his rate stats, but if we’re resorting to “he’s only 51% better than average rather than 80% better like last year,” that’s officially grasping at straws territory. Tucker is a bona fide superstar who won’t turn 29 until January. He’ll have a qualifying offer hanging over him, but interested parties won’t care about sacrificing a draft pick and international funds if Tucker holds this pace and finishes the season around his current seven- to eight-WAR pace. Nothing Tucker has done this season should dissuade fans from thinking his next contract will at least start with a 4, and it very well could top the half-billion threshold.

2. Dylan Cease, RHP, Padres

Stats since last edition: 44 1/3 innings, 3.45 ERA, 29.8 K%, 7.7 BB%

Cease is still lugging a 4.58 ERA in late May, but that’s due almost entirely to an April 8 bludgeoning at the hands of the A’s. He hasn’t given up more than three runs in any of his other starts, and his production since that regrettable outing is exactly the type you’d expect from a pitcher of this caliber. The 29-year-old righty has done his best work of late, holding opponents to nine runs with a 33-to-5 K/BB ratio over his past four starts (at Yankee Stadium, home versus the Angels, at Toronto’s Rogers Centre, at Atlanta’s Truist Park). He’s pitched into the seventh inning in three of those four starts. Metrics like FIP (3.24) and SIERA (3.20) feel that Cease’s ERA should be at least a full run lower.

He’s had a few shorter outings this season — none more so than that A’s hiccup — but Cease has taken the ball 11 times and continued to pitch like the sport’s most durable starter. He’s never been on the major league injured list and leads MLB in games started dating back to 2020. Assuming he continues to distance himself from that A’s meltdown, this would be Cease’s third sub-4.00 ERA in four seasons, including a Cy Young runner-up effort back in 2022. His 96.8 mph average fastball is as strong as ever. This year’s gaudy 15.7% swinging-strike rate would actually be a career-high, as would his 33.8% opponents’ chase rate. Cease won’t turn 30 until December. He’s a lock to reject a qualifying offer, and he’ll have a real chance at surpassing $200MM in free agency based on his age, power repertoire, swing-and-miss ability and unrivaled durability.

3. Alex Bregman, 3B, Red Sox

Stats since last update: .305/.407/.602, nine homers, 11 doubles, 17.3 K%, 12 BB%

Bregman was on one of the hottest streaks of his career prior to a recent quadriceps strain that will sideline him for more than a month — possibly close to two. It’s awful timing given just how excellent Bregman was prior to the injury, but the strength of that performance still puts a substantial payday on the table in a way it may not have been just this past offseason.

Bregman had to shake off the stink of an early slump last year — one of the worst six-week stretches of his career. When he finally did so, he did it in a way that still raised some red flags. Namely, Bregman’s walk rate even during his good stretch over the final four months of the 2024 campaign was about half what it’d been in prior seasons. There were genuine questions about his approach at the plate, and he carried a career-worst (in a full season) .315 on-base percentage into free agency.

This year’s walk rate is just shy of 10%, and as noted already, it was up to 12% during his recent run of excellence. Bregman has never hit the ball as hard as he has in 2025. He’s averaging 92 mph off the bat — up from his previous career-high of 89.4 mph — and sporting a 48.1% hard-hit rate that’s a career-best by more than eight percentage points.

If Bregman returns from his quad injury and struggles, it will unquestionably impact his earning power. If he returns and looks like the hitter he’s been through his first 226 plate appearances, he might have a case to top the precedent-setting contracts secured by Freddie Freeman (six years, $162MM) and Matt Chapman (six years, $151MM) ahead of their age-32 campaigns (the same age Bregman will be in free agency). He won’t have a qualifying offer this time around, and this type of offensive performance, coupled with Bregman’s glove and the type of clubhouse demeanor and leadership teams covet, could push him past $175MM and might even have $200MM in play.

Injury notwithstanding, there might not be a player in baseball who’s helped his free agent case as much as Bregman with his blistering start.

4. Framber Valdez, LHP, Astros

Stats since last update: 51 innings, 3.71 ERA, 20.8 K%, 7.7 BB%, 57.2 GB%

Valdez’s stats since the publish of our initial rankings are skewed by one awful start the night those rankings were released. He was torched for seven runs in St. Louis but has rebounded tremendously, as one would expect for a top-tier starter. Anyone looks better when you sweep their worst performance under the rug, but Valdez has a 2.68 ERA, 21.7% strikeout rate and 59% ground-ball rate across his past 47 innings.

Valdez might not come to mind right away when MLB fans try to rattle off the league’s best pitchers, but he’s a hard-throwing, durable lefty who misses bats and limits walks at strong rates and is perhaps the sport’s premier ground-ball pitcher (at least in regard to starting pitchers). Virtually no one in MLB can be relied upon for as many innings per start as Valdez, who’s completed six or more frames in eight of his 11 outings. He’s ninth in the majors in innings pitched despite six of the eight names ahead of him having an extra start under their belts. In an era where pitchers increasingly depart the game after five frames, Valdez has averaged 6 1/3 innings per start since 2021 — and done so with a pristine 3.11 ERA, roughly average strikeout and walk rates, and the second-highest ground-ball rate of any starter in baseball (61.9% to Andre Pallante’s 62%).

The only thing holding Valdez back is his age. He’ll turn 32 in November. As shown in MLBTR’s Contract Tracker, there have only been four starting pitchers in the past 15 years to land a free-agent contract of five years or more beginning in their age-32 campaign (or later): Cliff Lee (five years, $125MM in 2010), Zack Greinke (six years, $206.5MM in 2015), Jacob deGrom (five years, $185MM in 2022) and Blake Snell (five years, $182MM just this past offseason).

If Valdez were a year younger, we might realistically be talking about a six-year contract. Most teams will probably be pushing for him on a high-AAV four-year deal instead, but Valdez is (somewhat quietly) so good that he’ll have a real chance to follow Snell as a recent exception to that rule about long-term deals for 32-year-old pitchers.

5. Bo Bichette, SS, Blue Jays

Stats since last update: .261/.310/.427, five homers, four steals, 16.7 K%, 6.5 BB%

On the last set of rankings, we noted that while Bichette’s general batting line was fairly pedestrian, he was back to making loud contact and putting the ball in play with great frequency. All of the ingredients for an uptick in power seemed to be in place, and if Bichette can hit like he did from 2019-23, most will overlook a down year at the plate during a 2024 season in which he was clearly hobbled by injury. Twenty-eight-year-old shortstops with plus hit tools, above-average power and above-average speed don’t come around all that often on the open market.

Since that writing, the power has indeed begun to manifest. Bichette has homered five times in his past 168 plate appearances and cracked another 11 doubles. He’s still not producing at an elite rate, but he’s averaging 91.3 mph off the bat with a 49.7% hard-hit rate. Those are very strong numbers that fall right in line with his 2019-23 batted-ball metrics. Bichette is hitting more line drives, fewer grounders and has popped up at a much lower rate. He’s still “only” about 8% better than average at the plate, but Statcast credits him with an “expected” batting average of .310, nearly 40 points higher than his current mark, and an “expected” slugging percentage of .495 — almost 90 points north of his current level.

In reality, Bichette is probably going to either position himself for a huge contract in free agency or follow the path taken by Cody Bellinger, Matt Chapman and others over the years: sign an opt-out-laden, short-term deal that can get him back to market as soon as possible. At least for the time being, all of the arrows on his batted-ball profile are pointing up. If he can put together a big summer, then as recently laid out by MLBTR’s Darragh McDonald, there’s no reason to think he can’t push for a contract somewhere in the Dansby Swanson ($177MM) to Carlos Correa ($200MM) range.

6. Michael King, RHP, Padres

Stats since last update: 33 1/3 innings, 2.70 ERA, 29.9 K%, 6.7 BB%

King seemingly bolsters his case every time he takes the mound. He’s currently unable to do so, sitting on the 15-day IL due to inflammation in his right shoulder, but there’s no indication it’s a serious injury. The Padres called it a pinched nerve, which has an uncertain timeline, but said there’s nothing wrong structurally (link via AJ Cassavell of MLB.com). If he returns in short order and keeps up his prior pace, he’s going to cash in handsomely.

King is still relatively new to starting. This is only his second full season in a rotation, but he’s been borderline elite ever since moving into the role. He’s averaging 5 2/3 innings per start this season — same as in 2024 — and currently boasts a 2.95 ERA with a 28.4% strikeout rate and 7.6% walk rate. Both are slight improvements over his strikeout and walk rates from 2024, and both (the strikeout rate in particular) are better than the league average.

Since the Yankees put King into the rotation late in 2023, he’s started 49 games with a 2.70 ERA, 28.4% strikeout rate and 7.5% walk rate — a near-mirror image of what he’s done in this season’s 10 starts. It’s not the most conventional path to top-of-the-rotation status, but King increasingly looks the part of a genuine Game 1 or Game 2 playoff starter. He’s not necessarily flashy, averaging 93.7 mph on his heater and sporting good-but-not-elite rate stats. It doesn’t matter, though. The end results are excellent and appear sustainable.

King turned 30 last weekend. That makes the 2026 season technically his age-31 campaign, though the age gap between him and Zac Gallen is only a matter of about three months. It’s a bit misleading to call next season King’s age-31 season and Gallen’s age-30 season; they’re both right on the cusp of the arbitrary July 1 cutoff that’s generally accepted for that designation.

Because King started his big league career in the bullpen, his camp can argue that he has lesser mileage on his arm than most of the other pitchers on this list — while rivaling virtually any of them in quality. If he keeps this pace up, he’s a slam dunk to reject a qualifying offer, and a five-year deal seems like the floor. Six years and an annual value in the $25MM vicinity would very likely be on the table.

7. Cody Bellinger, 1B/OF, Yankees

Stats since last update: .279/.356/.507, seven homers, nine doubles, 14.4 K%, 11.3 BB%

Here we go again. The near perennial conundrum that is Bellinger’s free agent status is again being thrust into the spotlight. Bellinger has shaken off a terrible start to his season and looks well on his way to a better season at the plate than the good-not-great performance he turned in last year in his final season as a Cub.

At present, Bellinger’s .258/.329/.457 slash checks in 20% better than average, according to the wRC+ metric (which weights for a hitter-friendly home setting in the Bronx). The recent hot streak, however, suggests that his season batting line will end up a good bit north of that rate still.

Bellinger will have several things going for him in this bite at the free-agent apple that he didn’t in the past. He was a non-tender coming off two terrible years in the 2022-23 offseason, when he signed a one-year deal with the Cubs. He turned in a brilliant 2023 season, but his market that winter was clouded by skepticism regarding his performance in 2021-22 and a pretty lackluster batted-ball profile that pointed to regression. He also had a qualifying offer with which to contend. After returning to the Cubs on a three-year, $80MM deal with a pair of opt-outs, he had a decent but not great year at the plate in 2024. He chose to forgo an opt-out last winter, recognizing that he could pocket $32.5MM more on his current deal and opt out again if he hit well in 2025.

He’s not just hitting well this year, he’s eliminating the red flags that plagued him previously. The ugly 87.9 mph average exit velocity and 31.4% hard-hit rate he showed in ’23 have been replaced by marks of 90 mph and 40.5%. Below-average walk rates in 2023-24 have been swapped out for a hearty 10.3% mark this year. Is he selling out for power and improved batted-ball contact at the expense of contact? Nope. His 17.8% strikeout rate is up from the 15.6% mark he posted in 2022-23, but his swinging-strike rate is actually down to a career-low 8.8%. As noted already, his strikeout rate since the last MLBTR Power Rankings is just over 14%.

Bellinger won’t have a qualifying offer. It’s crazy to think he’s still only 29, since we’ve been talking about him as a free agent for three years now. His return to free agency will come ahead of his age-30 season, and all the arrows are pointing up. A nine-figure deal will be in play if this keeps up, and it’s easy to imagine Bellinger and Scott Boras taking aim at George Springer’s $150MM guarantee or Brandon Nimmo’s $162MM guarantee.

8. Ranger Suarez, LHP, Phillies

Stats since last update: 30 1/3 innings, 2.97 ERA, 24.6 K%, 7.9 BB%, 47.6 GB%

Suarez missed the first five weeks of the season with a back injury — a concerning start to his platform season even before considering that this is now his second straight year missing a month or more due to back troubles. In 2023, he was limited to just 22 starts by a hamstring strain and an elbow strain.

That’s a whole lot of ominous injury history, but Suarez’s performance when he’s on the mound rarely disappoints. That’s eminently true in 2025, when he’s roared out of the gates with a sub-3.00 ERA and better-than-average strikeout, walk and ground-ball rates. His average fastball, which dipped to a career-low 91.8 mph last year, is back up to 92.3 mph. It’s not quite to the 93.4 mph he averaged in 2023, but it’s still a positive trend.

Whenever Suarez is healthy, he’s a good bet to average about 5 2/3 innings per start while turning in strikeout, walk and ground-ball rates that are comfortably better than average. He’s rarely posted elite marks in any of those categories (save, perhaps, for 2022’s grounder rate of 55.4%), but Suarez consistently performs like a No. 2-3 starter. He’s a legitimate option for a postseason rotation and has been deployed as such by the Phils dating back to 2022. Oh, and his results in those playoff starts? Suarez has 37 2/3 postseason frames in his career, all coming as a starter with the Phillies, and he’s logged an immaculate 1.43 ERA with a 26.1% strikeout rate and 7.8% walk rate.

Suarez might not be the first name that springs to mind when thinking about $100MM starters, but he won’t turn 30 until August and should have a chance to land in the $110-115MM range achieved by Robbie Ray and Kevin Gausman a few years back. If he keeps up his current pace, he could even top the AAV on those five-year deals by a few million.

9. Pete Alonso, 1B, Mets

Stats since last update: .279/.376/.500, seven homers, 11 doubles, 24.3 K%, 11.6 BB%

Alonso opened the 2025 season on one of the most epic slugging binges of any hitter in recent memory. His April stats look like something out of Rookie mode from MLB: The Show. The Polar Bear slashed .343/.474/.657 through the end of April (214 wRC+) — and he did it with a near 17% walk rate and a strikeout rate shy of 15%.

That carried into the first few days of May, but Alonso has cooled considerably over his past 20 games, hitting .192/.244/.321. Worse yet, that incredible K-BB profile has gone up in flames. He’s punched out in 33.7% of his plate appearances during this slump against just a 5.8% walk rate. Alonso has two multi-hit games in this stretch compared to seven hitless performances. His 93.1 mph average exit velocity and 49% hard-hit rate are still great, but they’re nowhere near the 95.3 mph and 59.4% marks he carried through May 5.

Alonso’s early heroics still carry some weight, and if he can break out of these May doldrums and continue onward near his composite .290/.391/.541 batting line, he’s going to be compensated very nicely in free agency. His ultimate payday hinges on whether he’s closer to April’s Dr. Jekyll or May’s Mr. Hyde, but Alonso won’t have a qualifying offer hanging over him in free agency this time around and could top $100MM with another four months of mostly productive slugging.

10. Kyle Schwarber, DH/OF, Phillies

Stats since last update: .250/.390/.549, 13 homers, 17.5% BB%, 23.7% K%

While many of the other hitters in the class have struggled and/or battled injury, Schwarber has remained an impact power presence in the middle of Philadelphia’s lineup. He’s tied for second in the majors with 19 home runs and owns a massive .252/.394/.569 slash line across 249 plate appearances. He’s trending towards a career season, leveling up from an already excellent first three years with the Phils.

Schwarber carries a .224/.349/.496 slash over the course of his four-year, $79MM free agent deal. He’s one of three players (joining Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani) with at least 150 homers since the start of the 2022 season. Schwarber may not provide much value outside the batter’s box, but he’s on the shortlist of the sport’s best sluggers right now.

If this list were based solely on the player’s platform year performance, Schwarber would be in the top five. He’s off that pace in a list based on earning power. As MLBTR’s Darragh McDonald covered in much greater detail last week, the market generally doesn’t look kindly on designated hitters or position players approaching their mid-30s. Schwarber will be entering his age-33 season — a time at which hitters almost never get to five years or $25MM annually. He’ll probably buck the latter trend, with a four-year deal around $25MM per season giving him the best chance to reach nine figures. A higher AAV over three years that results in an $80-90MM guarantee isn’t out of the question.

The Phillies will make an effort to keep him around. Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reported in April that Schwarber had rejected an offseason extension proposal. Talks didn’t progress at the time. President of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski told Jon Heyman and Joel Sherman of The New York Post this week that the Phils “would love to keep him as part of the organization for the long term, no doubt.” At the very least, they’ll make him a qualifying offer to ensure they get draft compensation if he walks.

Honorable Mentions (listed alphabetically): Shane Bieber, Zach Eflin, Jack Flaherty, Zac Gallen, Paul Goldschmidt, Trent Grisham, Ryan Helsley, Rhys Hoskins, Tyler Mahle, Munetaka Murakami, Cedric Mullins, Josh Naylor, Ryan O’Hearn, Robert Suarez, Gleyber Torres, Luke Weaver

The 2025 season is well underway, which for most baseball fans means there’s five-plus months of highlights, daily transactions, trade deadline drama, postseason races and an eventual World Series all still to come. That’s true for us at MLBTR as well, but we’re nothing if not offseason enthusiasts (or, put another way, sickos) — so this also presents a good opportunity to take a look ahead to the upcoming 2025-26 class of MLB free agents. Myself, Anthony Franco, Darragh McDonald and MLBTR founder Tim Dierkes (the aforementioned sickos) consulted with each other to form these rankings.

The top name long expected to headline the 202526 market actually won’t be on the market at all. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. already put pen to paper on a historic $500MM extension that will keep him in Toronto for an additional 14 seasons, from 2026-39. That might remove some of the drama from the top of next year’s class, but it’s nevertheless a star-studded group that could feature one of the ten or even five largest contracts in MLB history, depending on how the 2025 season plays out. There will also be at least one very high-profile star posted from Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball, plus a pair of frequent Cy Young contenders and several other marquee names who have the ability to opt out of their current contracts.

As a reminder for longtime readers or an explanation for newcomers to MLBTR, our rankings are not necessarily a ranking of who the “best” players are in free agency. Rather, we sort our lists by perceived earning power. For instance, no matter how good a season 42-year-old Justin Verlander has, he’s not likely to rank ahead of a 30-year-old mid-rotation starter on our list, because the younger pitcher will be able to secure a larger guarantee on a long-term pact that won’t be available to a future Hall of Famer in the twilight of his career. Kirby Yates could have the best season of any reliever in MLB — but as someone who’ll be 39 in 2026, he won’t place all that highly because the length of his contract will be capped by his age.

As Guerrero and Juan Soto have recently proven, age is king when it comes to earning power. Major league front offices and owners will shell out for players in their mid-20s in a way they simply won’t for someone who reaches free agency at the more typical 30 or 31 years old. Teams want to be buying prime years, and while there are rare exceptions like Aaron Judge, most free agents who hit the market after already having turned 30 (and certainly after having turned 31) are viewed relatively tepidly — even coming off big seasons.

We’re quite early in the process right now, so this list will change as the year progresses. We’ll have multiple updates to our rankings over the course of the season, as injuries, breakouts and/or poor performances from potential top free agents impact the calculus. Note that players with club options are not included, but players with player options/opt-outs are included. Any player with a club option is going to have that option exercised if he plays well enough to otherwise be considered for this list.

With all of that in mind, let’s dive into the list.

1. Kyle Tucker, OF, Cubs

The Cubs traded a significant package of young talent for the final year of control over Tucker, shipping infielder Isaac Paredes, young starter Hayden Wesneski and 2024 first-round pick Cam Smith to the Astros in that headline-grabbing December swap. By all accounts, it was a weighty return for Houston even at the time — and that looks all the more true following the improbable scenario that saw all three of Paredes, Wesneski and — incredibly — Smith break camp with the team.

Chicago had good reason to pay a steep price. Tucker may not draw as much national fanfare as longtime teammates like Bregman, Jose Altuve and Yordan Alvarez, but when he’s healthy he’s among the best all-around players on the planet. The understated Tucker was selected just three picks after Bregman in 2016, going to Houston fifth overall. Like so much of the now-departed Astros core, he was a top prospect who graduated to the majors at a young age (21). It took a couple years for Tucker to truly cement himself in the Houston lineup, but he never looked back following a breakout in the shortened 2020 season.

From the time of a September call-up in 2019 through 2023, Tucker was consistently excellent. His “worst” full season in that time saw him deliver offense that was 22% better than league average, by measure of wRC+. His cumulative batting line of .277/.349/.517 checked in 36% better than par. Tucker continually bolstered his walk rate while reducing his strikeouts, hitting for power and chipping in quality baserunning and plus corner defense along the way.

Tucker was already a star heading into 2024, but he broke out as a full-fledged MVP candidate in a half-season’s worth of games last year. A fracture in his shin limited him to only 78 games, but when he was on the field, Tucker delivered a preposterous .289/.408/.585 batting line with 23 homers in just 338 turns at the plate. He walked in a career-best 16.5% of his plate appearances and fanned at a career-low 15.9% clip. He continued posting elite batted-ball metrics. Simply put, there were no holes in Tucker’s game — other than that untimely injury that truncated his sensational showing.

Cubs fans fretted this spring when Tucker struggled and Smith lit up Cactus League pitching, but now that the regular season is underway, the roles have reversed. Tucker looks as good as he ever has, while Smith looks very much like a 22-year-old who was rushed to the majors after just 32 minor league games. That’s not to say Smith’s future isn’t overwhelmingly bright, but as is often the case, spring narratives tend to look like a distant memory in a hurry.

Tucker is slashing a comical .324/.442/.648. He’s improved in nearly every season of his career and now stands as a 28-year-old MVP candidate with plus-plus offense, plus right field defense and deceptive baserunning acumen. Statcast only credits Tucker with 33rd percentile sprint speed, but he had an identical percentile ranking in 2023 when he nevertheless swiped 30 bases in 35 tries. He’s 97-for-110 in career stolen base attempts — a massive 88.1% success rate that proves you don’t have to be a burner to be excellent on the bases.

The icing on the cake for Tucker is that he won’t turn 29 until next January. He’ll play all of 2026 at that age. Most of the other bats on the market will be entering their age-30 seasons or later. Tucker is selling an extra year of his prime, and that will reward him handsomely. If he can sustain his 2024 pace over a full season, he could sign the fourth $400MM+ contract in major league history next winter, and at the very least, he’ll be in position to surpass Mookie Betts’ 12-year, $365MM deal in Los Angeles. Tucker will receive and reject a qualifying offer, but he’s so clearly above the rest of the class that said QO will be a non-factor in his market.

2. Dylan Cease, RHP, Padres

Among the starting pitchers on this list, Cease boasts the best combination of youth, stuff and track record. His season clearly hasn’t started as hoped, though his 7.98 ERA is attributable to one bludgeoning at the hands of the A’s, who tagged him for nine runs. Cease has had relatively uneven results on a year-to-year basis, but he’s been baseball’s most durable starter since 2020 and the collective body of work is excellent. No one in MLB has topped Cease’s 145 starts since Opening Day 2020, and he sports a combined 3.64 ERA along the way.

That earned run average is good, not great, but it’s skewed by a 2023 season in which Cease was tagged for a 4.58 ERA despite running his typically excellent strikeout numbers. Playing in front of a terrible White Sox defense that year, Cease was tagged for a career-worst .330 average on balls in play, which contributed to a career-worst 69.4% strand rate. It wasn’t all bad luck, as Cease also surrendered the most hard contact of his career, but metrics like FIP (3.72) and SIERA (4.10) thought he was quite misfortunate all the same.

On the other side of the spectrum, Cease’s 2022 season was utterly dominant. He finished runner-up to Justin Verlander in AL Cy Young voting on the back of a pristine 2.20 ERA with a massive 30.4% strikeout rate. At his best, Cease is an ace-caliber arm whose arsenal is headlined by a sharp bat-missing slider in the 88 mph range and a plus four-seamer that sits 96-97 mph annually. Cease will also mix in a knuckle curve and a changeup, but those are more show-me offerings complementing his dominant one-two heater/slider punch.

Cease is the youngest pitcher on these rankings, albeit only by a matter of a couple months in one case. He’ll pitch all of the 2026 season at 30 years old, however, meaning a seven-year deal would “only” run through his age-36 season. Eight years would take him through age-37. That’s the point at which most free agent mega-contracts for pitchers halt, though Max Fried notably signed through his age-38 season with the Yankees (an atypical stopping point, though arguably he received six- or seven-year money spread across eight seasons for luxury purposes).

With a strong season, Cease will have the best shot at cracking $200MM of any pitcher on this list. He should command at least six years, with a good chance at seven and an outside possibility of eight. If he’s not traded, he’ll receive and reject a QO, which should have little (if any) impact on his market.

3. Bo Bichette, SS, Blue Jays

Bichette’s 2024 season was a mess. He struggled through the season’s first two-plus months before a pair of summer calf strains landed him on the shelf — first for three weeks and then, a second time, for nearly two months. He returned for one game in September, suffered a broken finger in a freak accident during fielding drills, and required season-ending surgery. The end result? A 78-game season in which he hit just .225/.277/.322. Woof.

So far in 2025, Bichette is doing his best to put that injury-wrecked season behind him. He surprisingly hasn’t homered yet, but the 27-year-old is slashing .314/.364/.386 and absolutely stinging the ball. Bichette’s huge 52.5% hard-hit rate would be a career-best. His 91.7 mph average exit velocity and 9.8% barrel rate would be the second-best marks in his excellent young career. Bichette may not be hitting for power yet, but he’s blistering the ball and elevating it at career-high levels. His 41% grounder rate is a career low, and a comical 34.4% of his batted balls have been line drives. A 13% strikeout rate and 84.3% contact rate (95.1% in the zone) are career-best marks.

Any player seeing the ball this well and hitting the ball so authoritatively is going to see the power come around eventually. Statcast credits Bichette with an “expected” .365 average and .601 slugging percentage. Those numbers won’t hold over a full season, but Bichette is showing plenty of strong indicators that he’s playing at a level much closer to his 2019-23 form (.299/.340/.487, 126 wRC+) than his 2024 form.

Defense will continue to be a question mark. Bichette has never graded as a particularly strong shortstop, and he doesn’t display the sort of plus arm you’d see from someone who could seamlessly slide over to third base. He’d certainly have the range and hands for the position, but throwing-wise, it may not be an ideal fit.

That’ll be a point to consider for any club, but most will view Bichette as a young free agent who can handle shortstop for at least the first few seasons of his next contract. He may not be a plus defender, but he’s also not presently a liability who requires an immediate shift to another spot on the diamond. And, with Bichette playing the entire 2025 season at just 27 years old, he’s a much, much younger bat than any other prominent free agent this winter.

If Bichette’s early positive signs at the plate ultimately yield a rebound to his prior form, that age and production from a shortstop-capable middle infielder will likely push him north of $200MM. Even if he has only a partial rebound at the plate, his age, position and offensive upside should land him in the $140-175MM range we saw with other shortstops on the right side of 30 (Javier Baez, Trevor Story, Dansby Swanson).

4. Munetaka Murakami, 1B/3B, NPB (Yakult)

Some readers might be surprised to see Murakami’s name this high. Some may not be familiar with him at all. The 25-year-old slugger has been a star for Japan’s Yakult Swallows since he debuted at age 18, but he hasn’t necessarily garnered the international fanfare of countrymen Roki Sasaki, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Shohei Ohtani — at least not yet.

That’ll likely change this year, so long as he remains a highly productive slugger. Murakami’s three-year deal with Yakult reportedly stipulates that he be posted following the 2025 campaign. He turned 25 just over two months ago, meaning that under MLB’s international free agent system, he’ll now be considered a professional who can sign with any team for any amount.

As previously mentioned, age is king in free agency. But if there’s a co-ruler, so to speak, it’s power and/or perceived upside. Murakami offers both in spades. The third baseman’s peak season came in 2022, when he posted a Herculean .318/.458/.711 batting line with a colossal 56 home runs and nearly as many walks (19.3%) as strikeouts (20.9%). He hasn’t replicated that absurd stat line since, and he’s become more strikeout prone in the two subsequent seasons. That includes a career-worst 29.8% rate in 2024.

Be that as it may, Murakami has been no worse than 53% better than average at the plate in Japan in each season dating back to 2020. Even as his offense “declined” in 2023-24, he popped 31 and 33 homers, respectively. Even if his 2022 season is an outlier, he’s slashed .250/.377/.486 with 64 homers during his age-23 and age-24 campaigns.

Murakami has been a third baseman in Japan, but the general expectation is that he’ll need to move to first base at some point down the road. Back in 2023, Baseball America’s Kyle Glaser rated Murakami as the No. 3 prospect in that year’s World Baseball Classic, trailing only Sasaki and Yamamoto. Glaser wrote that he can hit both high-velocity fastballs and quality breaking pitches while showing power to all fields. Listed at 6’2″ and 213 pounds, he’s credited with plenty of arm for third base but more limited range that could eventually force him across the diamond.

FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen has differing opinions in an updated report that’s reflective of Murakami’s 2023-24 downturn at the plate. Longenhagen points out that Murakami has hit just .154 on fastballs topping 93 mph in recent years but has outstanding recognition of breaking balls and “titanic pole-to-pole power.” He also credits him with enough improvements to stick at third base, even if he doesn’t project as a plus defender there.

Clearly, there are potential areas for improvement. But this list is based on earning potential, and if Murakami can cut improve his recent struggles against velocity, cut down on strikeouts and/or return to his 2022 level of power output, the defensive gains he’s made and his extreme youth could make him the most coveted non-Tucker player on this list. There’s a broad range of outcomes with Murakami, more so than any player on this list, but if everything clicks it’s feasible that he could sign one of the largest contracts of any player to make the jump from NPB to MLB. His performance will be well worth keeping an eye on. He’s already a two-time Nippon Professional Baseball MVP. Age and track record alone make him a candidate for a nine-figure deal, and a big enough performance could see him push for $200MM+ or even $300MM+, following in Yamamoto’s footsteps.

5. Alex Bregman, 3B, Red Sox

The mega-contract Bregman sought wasn’t quite there in free agency this past offseason. He reportedly received offers worth $156MM and $172MM from Houston and Detroit, respectively, before (by Bregman’s own telling) the Red Sox stepped up late with a hearty $40MM AAV on an opt-out-laden contract of three years. Heavy deferrals knock the net-present AAV down below $30MM, but Bregman opted for the short-term pact in hopes that a different market, a more steady performance than his uneven 2024 output, and a lack of a qualifying offer would bring him more compelling offers next winter. The $172MM offer from the Tigers reportedly deferred $40MM as well, though it’s unclear how far into the future that money would have been pushed and how the net present value would have been impacted.

So far, Bregman is out to a fine start, slashing .290/.342/.464 with a pair of homers in 76 plate appearances. Some of the same red flags that applied to his slow start last year are present again, however. His 5.3% walk rate is a career-low and nowhere near the 13.8% he posted from 2018-23. After his walk rate plummeted to 6.9% last year, it’d be more encouraging to see him showing a more disciplined approach. Bregman’s 21.1% strikeout rate would also be a career-worst over a full season. He has plenty of time to whittle that down, and a paltry 4.3% swinging-strike rate and career-high 88.9% contact rate suggest that might just be some small-sample smoke. From 2018-24, Bregman fanned in only 12.5% of his plate appearances.

Those superlative contact skills play a large role in Bregman’s overall appeal. At his best, he sported a plus walk rate and elite contact skills with good defense at third base and plenty of power. Detractors often point to the short left field porch from which Bregman benefited during his Houston days, but he was every bit as productive and powerful on the road as he was at the now-former Minute Maid Park (which was renamed to Daikin Park in 2025).

Bregman and the Boras Corporation can and likely will point to anything north of $160MM next offseason combining with year one in Boston to earn a net sum topping $200MM for his free agent years. That type of offer was present last winter, and with a typical Bregman season it ought to be once again. Bregman will turn 32 next March, which puts him on the old side for a top-end free agent, but that’s the same age at which Matt Chapman signed a six-year, $151MM extension — and did so without the benefit of the open market. Bregman is the most consistent offensive player and should reach or exceed that, so long as he stays healthy and productive this year. If he doesn’t, he has a safety net of two years and $80MM in Boston (plus another opt-out opportunity following the 2026 season).

6. Zac Gallen, RHP, Diamondbacks

Gallen is older than Cease but only by a matter of four months. He’s nearly two full years younger than Framber Valdez, as he’ll turn 31 in August of his next contract’s first year. He’s been durable himself, but not quite to Cease’s level; Gallen’s 132 starts since 2020 trail Cease by 13, and while he’s worked a bit deeper per start on average, he’s still 33 innings shy of Cease dating back to 2020.

The results, of course, are perpetually great. Gallen carries a combined 3.38 ERA through 756 2/3 innings since 2020. He misses bats at a slightly lower level (26.3% strikeout rate) but still sits comfortably above average. He also boasts better command than his current division rival, having walked a solid 7.5% of his opponents in this span.

Gallen, however, doesn’t have the same power arsenal as many of the pitchers on this list, which could hamper some of the interest. He’s going to be highly coveted, of course, but pitchers who average 93.5 mph on their heater aren’t going to have the same earning power as those who average three miles harder if all else is relatively similar. Modern front offices are drawn to velocity and strikeouts like moths to a flame. A healthy Gallen is all but a lock to cash in on a nine-figure deal, but he might come in a year under Cease and/or a few million dollars lighter in terms of average annual salary. Like Cease, he’s a slam-dunk QO recipient who’ll reject it without a second thought.

7. Framber Valdez, LHP, Astros

Before sharing and discussing our own personal, initial rankings of the top 10, Anthony Franco, Darragh McDonald and I had Valdez ranging everywhere from eighth to third. It’s fair to quibble and suggest that among pitchers specifically, he should land anywhere from No. 2-5 on these rankings since he’ll turn 32 shortly after the season and this is based on earning power. Age won’t be on his side. Very few free agents heading into their age-32 season can command five-plus years. Over the past decade, the only starting pitchers to command five or more years heading into their age-32 season or later are Blake Snell, Yu Darvish, Jacob deGrom and Zack Greinke (six, for Greinke).

Valdez may not immediately jump out as someone who should be mentioned in the same breath as that group of arms, but his results indicate otherwise. The left-hander truly broke out in 2020, solidifying himself in Houston’s rotation with a dozen starts of 3.57 ERA ball. He’s never looked back. Heck, he’s only gotten better.

Since 2020, Valdez touts a 3.11 ERA, 24% strikeout rate and 8% walk rate in 125 starts. That’s 20 fewer starts than Cease and seven fewer than Gallen over the same span, but innings-wise he’s ahead of both. Valdez is the rare 2025 pitcher who averages better than six frames per start, sitting just over 6 1/3 innings per appearance. He had a big jump in stuff over the course of that stretch, too. After averaging a bit better than 93 mph on his sinker from 2020-22, he’s sitting 94.7 mph on the pitch dating back to 2023. He had similar gains on his curveball and changeup, which now sit 79.9 mph and 90 mph, respectively.

Because Valdez has such a good changeup, he has virtually no platoon split of which to speak. Lefties have hit him at an awful .215/.313/.318 clip, while righties are just as feeble at .227/.300/.340. Valdez’s power sinker also makes him the sport’s premier ground-ball starter. The only pitcher with a higher ground-ball rate since 2020 (min. 300 innings) is St. Louis righty Andre Pallante, though he’s shuttled between the rotation and bullpen for the Cards. Valdez’s 62% clip since 2020 tops Logan Webb, who’s next on the list, by nearly four percentage points.

Valdez will be a 32-year-old starter with a qualifying offer, barring a midseason trade. Typically, that’s an unfavorable package. However, he’s one of baseball’s top innings eaters and top ground-ball pitchers. He has better-than-average strikeout and walk numbers, and he’s a lefty with mid-90s velocity. Valdez posted a 3.57 ERA or better in five straight seasons from 2020-24. He’s out to a brilliant start. If he can manage a sub-3.00 ERA, it’d be his third in four years. If he were 30 with this exact same track record and statistical profile, he’d probably be second on this list. As it stands, he could still reach or exceed $150MM even if his age caps him at five years.

8. Michael King, RHP, Padres

There are plenty of similarities between King and Gallen, as recently explored by MLBTR’s Anthony Franco in a piece for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. Next year is technically King’s age-31 season, compared to Gallen’s age-30, but the age gap is scarcely more than two months. July 1 is the cutoff point used in those distinctions; King turns 31 on May 25, while Gallen would follow on Aug. 3. Because King spent so much time as a reliever, he can credibly claim to have fewer “miles” (i.e. innings) on that right arm.

More importantly and more simply, King can just point out that he’s been outstanding over the past four seasons. He posted a sub-3.00 ERA in relief in 2022, went sub-3.00 in 2023 between the bullpen and rotation, and repeated the feat as a full-time starter in 2024. Since Opening Day in ’22, King touts a 2.76 earned run average with a terrific 28.9% strikeout rate against a solid 8.2% walk rate. He’s kept the ball on the ground at a roughly average 42.3% rate. Metrics like FIP (3.11) and SIERA (3.35) agree that he’s been excellent.

King’s track record in the rotation isn’t especially long, but two seasons of top-notch starting pitching will be more than enough to convince teams he’s a viable rotation cog. Given his recent track record and his strong start, there’s little reason to think he’s in for any kind of collapse. The main knocks against him will be pedestrian velocity — 93.7 mph on his four-seamer and 92.9 mph on his sinker since Opening Day ’24 — age and qualifying offer. King’s contract technically has a mutual option, but there’s no chance it’ll be picked up. He’s going to turn that down, reject a qualifying offer, and justifiably seek a nine-figure contract. He’ll have a comparable case to Gallen, and both have a clear case to move beyond the $115-120MM range previously established by Robbie Ray and Kevin Gausman.

9. Ranger Suarez, LHP, Phillies

Another currently 29-year-old starter who’ll pitch most of next year at 30, Suarez is down the list a bit because he’s currently on the mend from a back injury. When he’s healthy, he’s been a consistently above-average starter for the Phillies. From 2021-24, Suarez holds a 3.27 ERA, 22.3% strikeout rate, 8% walk rate and 53.4% ground-ball rate. He’s averaged 93 mph on his four-seamer and 92.2 mph on his sinker in that time, though both were down in 2024, when he missed a month due to a different back injury.

Consecutive seasons impacted by back troubles will be difficult to ignore, and as someone with closer to average velocity, the margin for error becomes thinner. Suarez won’t stick on the list if he struggles or sees further declines in his stuff upon returning, but a healthy Suarez is a playoff-caliber arm with better-than-average strikeout, walk and ground-ball numbers. He also keeps the ball in the yard despite playing his home games in a bandbox; in the past four years, Suarez has averaged just 0.77 homers per nine frames. He consistently limits hard contact, and his ground-ball rate is a perennial plus.

The track record isn’t as long, but there are some parallels with Max Fried. The former Braves and current Yankees ace has better command, but both are lefties who lack plus velocity, have closer-to-average strikeout rates than most top starters and offset those “flaws” with heaps of grounders and a penchant for weak contact.

Suarez needs to get healthy and hold up over his final 27 to 28 starts of the season. If he does, he’ll have a chance to crack $100MM in free agency. The track record here is stronger than that of Eduardo Rodriguez, who’s twice landed free agent deals in the range of $80MM. Suarez is clearly a better pitcher than either Jameson Taillon (four years, $68MM) or Taijuan Walker (four years, $72MM) at the time of those respective free agent agreements. He could push into the Ray/Gausman range.

10. Pete Alonso, 1B, Mets

It’s hard to draw up a better start to year one of a pillow contract than the Polar Bear’s .321/.431/.660 slash through 15 games. Alonso has gone deep four times in 65 plate appearances. We’re still firmly in small sample territory, but he’s walked at what would be a career-best 13.8% clip and has the same strikeout rate (nine walks, nine strikeouts thus far).

We can take those rates with a grain of salt, given that we’re talking about two weeks’ worth of games here, but Alonso’s approach has looked quite a bit better this year. He’s chasing off the plate at a career-low 20.1% rate, per Statcast. His overall 84.4% contact rate would be a career-best mark by a huge six percentage points. More specifically, Alonso isn’t whiffing when he does chase off the plate; his 69.7% contact rate on pitches off the plate is miles ahead of his career 55.8% clip.

Batted-ball data paints Alonso in a more favorable light than ever. He’s averaging a comical 95.5 mph off the bat and has struck 62.2% of his batted balls at an exit velo of at least 95 mph. In virtually every way possible, Alonso just looks like a monster through the first two-plus weeks of the season. There’s no telling if he can sustain those gains over the remaining 90% of the season, but he could scarcely be performing better.

When Alonso hit the market this past offseason, he did so coming off a pair of all-or-nothing campaigns at the plate. His strikeout rate had climbed in consecutive years, and his previously elite offense had settled in as more good than great. From 2023-24, Alonso hit .229/.324/.480. The power was still elite, but the rest of his offensive profile was far more pedestrian. By measure of wRC+, he’d been 21% better than average over a span of two years. Again, that’s quite good — it’s just not superstar-caliber offense. And, for a first-base-only slugger who could move to DH over the course of a long-term deal, “good-not-great” offense isn’t going to cut it. The market seemingly agreed.

If Alonso can sustain even 75% of this ludicrous start to his season, he’ll be in a much stronger position this time around. He’d hit the market on the heels of a stronger platform year and do so without a qualifying offer. He already rejected one last winter, and a player can only receive one QO in his career. Alonso banked $20.5MM in his final arbitration season and will earn $30MM this year. He’d be $106.5MM shy of the $157MM guarantee he reportedly rejected on the Mets’ extension offer in 2023. If he’s hitting anywhere close to this level, that’d be attainable on even a four-year deal.

Alonso’s appetite for leaving Queens could come into play here. By all accounts, he hopes to stay with the Mets in free agency last time around. The Mets took a measured approach and eventually kept him on a two-year deal with an opt-out. If their preference is again a shorter term, would Alonso be open to it? One would imagine he’d be more willing to take a high-AAV three-year pact for the Mets than for any other club, at the very least. With Vladimir Guerrero Jr. off the market, there’s no longer a clearly better and younger first base option for the Mets to pursue.

A lot of factors will influence Alonso’s earning power and whether he remains a Met long term, but the outrageous strength of his start has him back in the top-10 on our rankings, even though there are quite a few players who could push into this mix as the year goes on.

Honorable Mentions (listed alphabetically): Luis Arraez, Cody Bellinger, Shane Bieber, Walker Buehler, Zach Eflin, Erick Fedde, Jack Flaherty, Ryan Helsley, Ha-Seong Kim, Cedric Mullins, Josh Naylor, Tyler O’Neill, J.T. Realmuto, Kyle Schwarber, Lane Thomas, Gleyber Torres, Devin Williams