The 2026 MLB Postseason is entering the Championship Series, but the time for fantasy baseball analysis never truly stops. Last Monday, we started our Rotoworld Staff and Friends Fantasy Baseball Mock Draft for the 2027 season. While many places do a “too early” mock draft, we’d argue that it’s not really too early to look ahead to next season. I’ve been posting a collection of “look back” articles reviewing the best picks of the 2026 season, the worst picks, and my key lessons, but all of these articles are linked together by the idea that immediately taking stock in the season, before the offseason hype starts to creep in, can be an incredibly valuable experience.
So we invited our staff and a few of our friends to put together a 15-round mock draft that we’ll complete over the next couple of weeks and continue to break down for you in chunks over on our site. Today you’ll get the first four rounds, and then I’ll be back to update the next four or five rounds by the end of the week and then do one more update at the end.
We hope you find it a useful tool, and we’ll see how much it changes over the next few weeks.
2027 Fantasy Baseball Mock Draft
Round 1 | ||||
| Pick | Manager | Player | POS | Team |
| 1 | RotoPat (Rotoworld) | Shohei Ohtani | UT/SP | LAD |
| 2 | George Bissell (Rotoworld) | Pete Crow-Armstrong | OF | CHC |
| 3 | Frank Stampfl (CBS Sports) | Bobby Witt Jr. | SS | KC |
| 4 | D.J. Short (Rotoworld) | Elly De La Cruz | SS | CIN |
| 5 | Scott Pianowski (Yahoo Sports) | Fernando Tatis Jr. | 2B/OF | SD |
| 6 | Rivers McCown (Rotoworld) | Junior Caminero | 3B | TB |
| 7 | Matthew Pouliot (Rotoworld) | Aaron Judge | OF | NYY |
| 8 | Dave Shovein (Rotoworld) | Juan Soto | OF | NYM |
| 9 | Frank Ammirante (RotoBaller) | Jackson Chourio | OF | MIL |
| 10 | James Schiano (Rotoworld) | James Wood | OF | WSH |
| 11 | Justin Mason (FanGraphs) | Yordan Alvarez | OF | HOU |
| 12 | Jorge Montanez (Rotoworld) | Ben Rice | 1B | NYY |
Perhaps the story here is that no starting pitchers went in the first 12 picks. One season after Tarik Skubal, Garrett Crochet, and Paul Skenes either got hurt or had down seasons, none of the drafters seemed willing to roll the dice on a starting pitcher with their first pick. Honestly, I can’t blame them. Early-round hitters, on average, continue to out-produce early-round pitchers at similar draft costs. The pitchers that do hit can make a huge difference for your team, but the risk is exponentially higher. A hitter taken here who fails to produce value, like Kyle Tucker this year, can still produce $10 of value, but a pitcher who goes in the first round and fails to produce value is almost always due to injury, and they can give you no value.
We did see Pat still choose Shohei Ohtani (dual position eligible here) as the top pick over Pete Crow-Armstrong. There are certainly some questions as to whether or not Ohtani’s body can hold up to a whole season as a starting pitcher and a DH, which will bring some uncertainty to his fantasy value. We also know he’s clearly not healthy right now, so we’ll need to see if any of these injuries require offseason surgery, but PCA has certainly worked his way into the conversation to be first overall.
A big surprise for some might be seeing Fernando Tatis Jr. this high. The Padres outfielder was one of the best hitters in baseball from June 1st on after a batting stance change allowed him to clear his hips more easily and unlock the pull-side power that we know he has. He also picked up 2B eligibility this season, which will be huge for him at a pretty barren position.
Jackson Chourio and James Wood have used breakout seasons to propel them into the first-round conversation, and you have to wonder if there is yet another level of development there, and Yordan Alvarez now has outfield eligibility in all formats, which makes him an even safer pick here. There look to be plenty of outfield options in the first round, including injured New York stars Juan Soto and Aaron Judge. Both of them being in the first round makes sense, but we may start to have to ask real questions about Judge’s durability. He’ll be 35 years old next season. He’s a giant human being, and the strain of playing the outfield every day at that size takes a real toll on your body. The fact that his two major injuries this season were both soft tissue or muscle injuries (and not a broken toe) should begin to raise some questions about whether or not we can count on 150+ games from Judge going forward.
His teammate, Ben Rice, used a 40-home run season to catapult him into the first round as well. That’s without catcher eligibility. Rice was the first 1B off the board in this draft, and I really find it hard to argue against that. Some guys in the next round have an argument, but Rice is a tremendous overall hitter. He has clear power. He plays in a great park for his approach, and there is no way the Yankees are going back to regularly sitting him against lefties. Even if Rice is more of a mid-30s home run hitter going forward than a true 40+ guy, his approach at the plate makes me feel good about his contact and batting average, and that puts him ahead of the guys who will follow him in round two.
Round 2 | ||||
| Pick | Manager | Player | POS | Team |
| 13 | Jorge Montanez | CJ Abrams | SS/2B | WSH |
| 14 | Justin Mason | Jose Ramirez | 3B | CLE |
| 15 | James Schiano | Jacob Misiorowski | SP | MIL |
| 16 | Frank Ammirante | Tarik Skubal | SP | LAD |
| 17 | Dave Shovein | Ronald Acuña Jr. | OF | ATL |
| 18 | Matthew Pouliot | Nick Kurtz | 1B | OAK |
| 19 | Rivers McCown | Jordan Walker | OF | STL |
| 20 | Scott Pianowski | Kyle Schwarber | DH | PHI |
| 21 | D.J. Short | Pete Alonso | 1B | BAL |
| 22 | Frank Stampfl | Corbin Carroll | OF | ARI |
| 23 | George Bissell | Cam Schlittler | SP | NYY |
| 24 | Roto Pat | Yoshinobu Yamamoto | SP | LAD |
And now the pitchers start to come off the board. Not really a surprise with who the first three arms were off the board: Jacob Misiorowski, Tarik Skubal, and Cam Schlittler. I assume those will be the top three arms in pretty much all rankings heading into 2027. Pat did snag Yoshinobu Yamamoto as the fourth starter picked in this round, and while some may argue for Chris Sale or Cristopher Sanchez here, there’s a strong case that Yamamoto could be locked into the fourth spot. There is still some elevated risk with starting pitchers in the second round, but at least every one of these teams added an elite bat in the first round, and both George and Pat were able to take second elite bats at the start of the third round, so this risk feels more palatable.
CJ Abrams is another player, like Tatis Jr., who picked up second base eligibility in most formats. That’s huge for his fantasy value. So is hitting .261 with 33 home runs and 34 steals while driving in 106 runs. Abrams will be 26 years old next season, and while his future in Washington is a bit cloudy, he’s an elite offensive talent who is finally making good on that promise.
We had some former first-round picks fall into the second with Jose Ramirez, Ronald Acuña Jr., and Corbin Carroll all falling into the second round. The falls make sense too. Ramirez and Acuña Jr. now just have a bit more injury risk than some of the other players going in the first round. Ramirez still has great upside at a position that lacks talent, which may drive his price up, but he’ll be 34 years old, and he hit just 12 home runs and batted .235 this year after hamate surgery. Are you willing to bet that he gets back to 100% of his old self, or do we think it’s more likely that he’ll be 75-80% of the guy who almost went 40/40 in 2024? Acuña Jr. is a harder bet because he has now played under 108 games in three straight seasons and has played over 120 games once since 2019. It’s hard to bet on a full season of production, and with PCA, Chourio, and James Wood emerging, it makes sense to go with the younger/healthier players.
At the same position, the most interesting name in this round is probably Jordan Walker. He had a breakout season this year, hitting .269 with 29 home runs, 102 RBI, and 22 steals. He also just turned 24 years old, so there is plenty of growth still possible for him. He struggled through an injury at the end of the year, which hurt his September stats, but there will be no half measures with Walker in 2027. You have to either be all-in on the fact that 2026 was a real breakout for a former top prospect or just acknowledge that you won’t be getting him in your drafts.
Pete Alonso and Nick Kurtz are the two first basemen I alluded to earlier who land here in round 2. Kurtz played just 99 games this season due to injury but still hit 21 home runs while batting .256. We know the hitting environment in Sacramento is elite, so he should still be going in this range.
Round 3 | ||||
| Pick | Manager | Player | POS | Team |
| 25 | Roto Pat | Sal Stewart | 1B | CIN |
| 26 | George Bissell | Konnor Griffin | SS | PIT |
| 27 | Frank Stampfl | Miguel Vargas | 3B | CHW |
| 28 | D.J. Short | Cristopher Sanchez | SP | PHI |
| 29 | Scott Pianowski | Paul Skenes | SP | PIT |
| 30 | Rivers McCown | Mason Miller | RP | SD |
| 31 | Matthew Pouliot | Julio Rodriguez | OF | SEA |
| 32 | Dave Shovein | Trea Turner | SS | PHI |
| 33 | Frank Ammirante | Gunnar Henderson | SS | BAL |
| 34 | James Schiano | Jackson Merrill | OF | SD |
| 35 | Justin Mason | Kevin McGonigle | SS/3B | DET |
| 36 | Jorge Montanez | Jesus Luzardo | SP | PHI |
We see three current-year rookies go in Round 3, announcing themselves as top-tier talents for years to come, and it’s hard to argue against it. Sal Stewart, Konnor Griffin, and Kevin McGonigle all showed that they can handle this level of competition, and we should expect more growth from these young players. The same goes for Miguel Vargas, who is not a rookie but broke out in 2026 in a way that suggests consistent value. He’s always had an elite plate approach, and now he added pull-side power to that equation. Vargas will be 27 years old and is in an ascending lineup, so he belongs in this range.
We saw the next group of starting pitchers go with Cristopher Sanchez, Paul Skenes, and Jesus Luzardo. Obviously, the name everybody will want to talk about is Skenes. It was a bad year for the Pirates ace, and while he claimed he wasn’t hurt, his velocity fell throughout the year, and he was not missing as many bats. There had been some previous concerns that his fastball wasn’t a huge whiff pitch to righties (10.7% swinging strike rate in 2025), but Skenes saw huge strides there this season. However, that was basically the only place he got better, and by elevating his four-seamer more for whiffs, he also started to allow more hard contact. It’s hard to see Skenes being this bad again, but we also can’t ignore how this season went.
Mason Miller went here as the first closer off the board, and three former first-round picks fell in Gunnar Henderson, Trea Turner, and Julio Rodriguez. I covered Gunnar and Trea in my article on what I learned from the 2026 fantasy baseball season, so you should read that, but essentially their 2025 price baked in a full return to peak value and ignored the warning signs from that season. We don’t appear to be doing that this year.
Round 4 | ||||
| Pick | Manager | Player | POS | Team |
| 37 | Jorge Montanez | Drew Rasmussen | SP | TB |
| 38 | Justin Mason | Chris Sale | SP | ATL |
| 39 | James Schiano | Francisco Lindor | SS | NYM |
| 40 | Frank Ammirante | Kyle Tucker | OF | LAD |
| 41 | Dave Shovein | Brice Turang | 2B | MIL |
| 42 | Matthew Pouliot | Zach Neto | SS | LAA |
| 43 | Rivers McCown | Oneil Cruz | OF | PIT |
| 44 | Scott Pianowski | Matt Olson | 1B | ATL |
| 45 | D.J. Short | Carson Benge | OF | NYM |
| 46 | Frank Stampfl | Chase Burns | SP | CIN |
| 47 | George Bissell | Hunter Goodman | C | COL |
| 48 | Roto Pat | Nolan McLean | SP | NYM |
Now we answer the question of how far Kyle Tucker falls as Frank Ammirante takes him with the fourth pick in the fourth round, 40th overall. I covered Tucker more extensively in my article revisiting the top two rounds of 2025 drafts, but the miss on Tucker was essentially looking at pedigree (his seasons before his last two injured ones) and also the team context (a move to the Dodgers) and ignoring that he hadn’t had a fully productive year in a while. I’m not sure anybody expected that Tucker would see his barrel-rate collapse and that he would make uncharacteristically aggressive, out-of-character swing decisions, so perhaps we can expect a slight bounce back to his previously healthy form.
Four more starting pitchers go off the board here, and it’s an interesting group. Drew Rasmussen was brilliant this season, but it was also his first over 150 innings, and he’s had three elbow surgeries. Can you bank on his health as your ace? Kind of the same question for Chris Sale, who will be 38 next year and has basically alternated healthy years with injured years. After being hurt for basically all of 2021-23, he threw 178 innings in 2024, then 125 in 2025, and then 163 this year. What’s in store for 2027?
The final two arms were young pitchers in Chase Burns and Nolan McLean. The Burns pick makes sense given his elite strikeout upside and plus raw stuff, but McLean is harder to see here. Not that he’s a bad pitcher, but taking him as the 11th starting pitcher is assuming tons of growth. His 26% strikeout rate and 16.6% K-BB% don’t line up with some of the elite arms in this range, and his 10.5% swinging strike rate continues to suggest some concern with his ability to consistently miss bats. He’ll be 26 next year, and he’s clearly a talented arm, but taking him this high means he really HAS to take the next step, or he won’t return value.
Oneil Cruz’s bounce-back season pushed him up into the fourth round, and he’s joined by young outfielder Carson Benge, who hit .282 with 20 home runs and 22 steals in his rookie season. He didn’t get the fanfare of the other rookies who went higher in this draft, but Benge has a true five-category skill set and should be in an improved lineup next season.
We also saw our first catcher go off the board in Hunter Goodman. Keep in mind that this is a one-catcher format, which is why you’re not seeing a lot of catchers go early, but George wanted to lock up an elite bat at the position. With Ben Rice no longer catcher eligible, Goodman was the top fantasy catcher this season after hitting 41 home runs, driving in 88 runs, and hitting .245 in Coors Field. There’s little reason to believe he can’t do it again.
That will wrap up the first four rounds of the draft. We’ll have another update next week with the top eight rounds and then a final update when the draft is over, so keep it locked to Rotoworld.
