2026 Fantasy Baseball Draft Prep: Chris Towers' Breakouts 1.0 includes Chase Burns, Eury Perez outlook

As it turns out, the "slow market" everyone was complaining about a few weeks ago might have just been a result of MLB teams … taking time off for the holidays. Yes, things were slow around the turn of the new year, but we've had a flurry of legitimately huge news stories come around in the past week or so. 

First, Kyle Tucker signed with the Dodgers on a four-year contract that will pay him $240 million – and potentially land him back in the first round of Fantasy drafts, if you ask Scott White. The Mets then pivoted from Tucker to sign Bo Bichette, a move that carries some risk for Fantasy with a park downgrade, though Bichette should benefit from two things: Hitting behind Juan Soto and Francisco Lindor; and making an expected transition to third base, giving him a bit of positional flexibility at arguably the two weakest spots on the infield. 

We then saw J.T. Realmuto re-sign with the Phillies, and Josh Lowe traded to the Angels, two moves Scott White also covered in the Offseason Tracker, which you can and should read here. And then on Tuesday night, we got another big move … well, it's a big name, at least. The Mets traded for Luis Robert from the White Sox, which fills their center field hole … with a guy who might not actually be an upgrade over Tyrone Taylor.

Okay, fine, Robert is probably an upgrade over Taylor. But Taylor's 84 wRC+ over the past two seasons is actually identical to Robert's mark in that same span. You can make a case that Robert has been held back by a terrible White Sox team, except that team was significantly more competitive in 2025 than 2024, and Robert was almost exactly as hopeless as he was the year before. It seems unlikely that Robert is just totally finished as a productive MLB player at 28, and the ceiling he showed in 2023 – remember, he had 38 homers and 20 steals in just 145 games – will have Fantasy players continuing to chase him. 

But I was iffy on his 130.6 ADP in NFBC drafts to date, and that number seems all but certain to rise as a result of this signing. And, given how little he's shown over the past two seasons, I just can't really get on board with that.

It's possible Robert has a big bounce-back season, but I'm not betting on it. In fact, in the rest of today's newsletter, I'm talking about three different categories of breakout for 2026, and "Bouncebacks to buy" are exactly one of those categories. And spoiler alert: Robert didn't make the list! 

As for the other two categories of breakout I'm writing about today, let's go with a couple of examples: One for a player who needs to make the leap to superstardom to justify the breakout tag and another who just needs to make the jump to stardom. 

On the one hand, you've got someone like Eury Perez. He's already being drafted as if he's proven to be a reliable Fantasy option, even if he hasn't quite been that just yet. Through his first 186.2 innings of work, Perez has a 3.71 ERA and 10.3 K/9, which is solid enough, but that's also come across two separate seasons separated by a full year in between them after he underwent Tommy John surgery in 2024. 

Perez has shown potential, and that potential is already enough to justify a 95.3 ADP in early drafts – a price that I suspect is only going to rise from here. Which is to say, Perez doesn't need to just be as good as he has been so far to justify his price; he needs to get better. Potentially a lot better. 

It's a bet that I'm willing to make in Perez's case. Let's not forget this: Despite making his MLB debut three years ago, Perez won't even be 23 years old under a few weeks after Opening Day – for context, that makes him younger than two of the three top pitching prospects in Scott White's Top 100 Prospects column, and he's only a few months older than Trey Yesavage, the third. He's held his own as a major-league pitcher despite being one of the youngest players in the league, and he was solid last season despite coming back from Tommy John surgery. Pitchers who are this good this young tend to become aces. It's mostly just a question of when. 

Then you go down the rankings a bit, and you've got Chase Burns. Burns isn't significantly cheaper than Perez, with an ADP sitting at 125.5, but that does reflect the difference between how Fantasy players are viewing them. There might be similar upside, but Burns is less of a sure thing than Perez. But that also means he doesn't have to hit quite as high a ceiling as Perez to justify his draft cost. Perez probably needs to make the leap to being a top-50 player, maybe even a top-25 one, to really end up being a big win; if Burns ends up a top-75 player in 2026, that's a pretty big win, on the other hand.

And, of course, Burns might be a whole lot better than that. He was arguably the top pitching prospect in baseball when he made his debut last summer, and while there were some growing pains, there were also some flashes of brilliance, most notably when he matched the MLB best mark with three straight starts with at least 10 strikeouts; he would follow that streak up with another 10-start outing two starts later. Burns' home park and team context won't help him out much, but with that kind of bat-missing upside, he could follow his teammate Hunter Greene's footsteps to become one of the most dominant pitchers in the game, even without much help from his surroundings.

I think Burns has that kind of upside, but even if he doesn't get there, I think he could justify this price and this tag. If he's more like a high-3.00s ERA pitcher with a ton of strikeouts but some headaches along the way, that's still a totally fine outcome given Burns' price, even if it would be at least mildly disappointing for Perez.

There's the difference. Now, let's get to the breakouts: 

Breakouts 1.0

The bounce-back candidates

He had a bad month. If you're wondering why Alvarez went from three straight seasons of an OPS of at least .959 to last year's .797 mark, that's it; one bad month. When he went on the IL in early May, he was hitting just .210/.306/.340; after he returned, he hit .369/.462/.569. There was nothing concerning at all in his underlying numbers, and he put those numbers up while playing through and then returning from a misdiagnosed hand fracture. Yes, he's missed a lot of time over the years with injuries, but even that looks like more of a fluke for 2025, when he had the misdiagnosed hand injury and then suffered an ankle sprain – his previous injuries were typically to his knees, but that hasn't really been an issue for him in a couple of years. In terms of pure skill as a hitter, I think Alvarez is in the Aaron Judge/Juan Soto/Shohei Ohtani tier, and now you can get him in the third or fourth round in most drafts. He'll remind anyone who has forgotten why he's a first-round caliber player in 2025. 

Jackson Merrill, OF, Padres

When Merrill went on the IL with a concussion in mid-June, he was hitting .304/.349/.474 and was on pace for 19 homers, 96 RBI, and 88 runs. Was it exactly what you drafted him to be? No, we were hoping for more power, and just one steal in 44 games was certainly disappointing. But you weren't really complaining about him at that point, either (especially since the lack of speed could be easily explained by a hamstring injury). Merrill was cleared to return shortly after going on the IL, but clearly wasn't the same guy for the next couple of months, as he hit .219/.286/.354 in his next 47 games before going on the IL with an ankle injury in mid-August. It's that stretch that made Merrill such a disappointment, and even a .946 OPS in September couldn't fully save his season. 

I know nobody likes to talk about excuses, but it sure seems like Merrill has a few pretty good ones. Being a major-league hitter is hard enough, let alone while being younger than most prospects still toiling away in the minors. We know Merrill has a terrific swing that can combine for both tons of contact and tons of hard-hit balls, and we know he's a plus athlete. This is a 22-year-old who everyone was convinced was going to be a top-25 player (at least!) for the next decade (at least!) this time a year ago. Buying the dip here is one of the easier calls on the board. 

Dylan Cease, SP, Blue Jays

Personally, I don't like roller coasters. When I went on a road trip with some friends after we graduated high school, two of them went to Cedar Rapids, and I stayed at our motel in Sandusky, Ohio, eating dinner at the world's saddest Ruby Tuesday's. Why? Because I know Cedar Rapids is all about the roller coasters, and I'm not a fan. Why spend my money going on a bunch of rides I know I won't like?

That's what life with Dylan Cease is like. If you've got the stomach for it, it can be a thrilling experience, but I know for many of you at this point, he might be persona non grata in drafts coming off a 4.55 ERA – his second time in three years with an ERA north of 4.50. And I don't blame you – even during his good seasons, there are often stretches where it feels like it's hurting you more than it's helping to have Cease around. 

I get the criticisms. But I also don't think they are entirely fair. In 2023, Cease struggled and deserved to struggle, pitching to an ugly 4.16 xERA that mostly matched his actual 4.58 mark. But the comparison to 2025 falls apart when you dig past the ugly ERA he shared in both seasons. His strikeout rate was 2.5% higher in 2025, while his walk rate was a tad lower, and his results on balls in play were quite a bit better. That's how you get an xERA of 3.46, compared to 2023's 4.16. 

That doesn't mean Cease will pitch that well, much less that you'll enjoy the experience of having him on your team. But it's a good sign that his skills didn't actually atrophy – as is the fact that the Blue Jays aggressively jumped out ahead of the market and signed him to a $210 million deal to kick off free agency. If they're that confident in him, why shouldn't I be? Cease can be frustrating, but he's just about the best bet for strikeouts in the game (five seasons in a row of at least 210), and has a pretty good chance at 15-plus wins if he gets a bit better luck this time around. 

Sandy Alcantara, SP, Marlins

If you didn't notice, I can't blame you, but Alcantara's bounce-back may have already happened in 2025. After closing out the first half with a trio of disastrous starts where he allowed 18 runs in 17 innings, Alcantara more or less immediately turned things around at the All-Star break, ultimately putting up a 3.33 ERA in his final 13 starts. The strikeout rate wasn't quite where we want it to be at 21.3%, but he did lower the walk rate to 6.0% from 9.0% – the strikeout rate was also a 4% improvement. Alcantara's stuff remains very impressive, and once he got his command back, he looked a lot like the guy who was one of the most dependable starters in baseball. Expect him to build on last year's 174.2 innings and push to be one of the few 200-inning pitchers in baseball, with an ERA a lot closer to what he managed in the second half of the season.

The superstar leap

Roman Anthony, OF, Red Sox

Full disclosure: I toyed with putting Anthony on my "Busts" list. There are a lot of ways things could go wrong for a second-year bat being drafted near the top-50 without any real stolen base upside, and it requires him to take a step forward to justify that price. 

But, ultimately, I think he's going to take that step. Let's start with where Anthony left things off as a rookie: in 71 games, he hit .292/.396/.463, showcasing an impressive command of the strike zone, at least plus raw power, and enough present-day skills as a hitter to put up a 183-run-plus-RBI pace. And that's without his swing being geared for tapping into the raw power consistently. And even that is something Anthony started to show signs of figuring out, as he put up a .407 xwOBA over his final 100 plate appearances, which would have been a top-five mark among all hitters in 2025. 

There's no guarantee Anthony will reach those highs, but he's certainly capable of it. It's hard to become a first-rounder for Fantasy if you don't consistently steal 15-plus bases, and Anthony's swing and home park aren't set up to make him a 30-homer threat, yet. But the baseline level of skills here is so high that I can't really see things going that poorly for him. And the upside looks something like a healthy Yordan Alvarez season. 

Samuel Basallo, C, Orioles

Basallo might be in that weird spot where, if he had just stayed down at Triple-A destroying baseballs, his price might actually be even higher than it is right now. That's because, just days after turning 21, the Orioles called him up to the majors, where he struggled, hitting just .165/.229/.330 in 31 games. Nobody is out on Basallo because of those struggles, but there's a bit less hype than there likely would have been if all we saw was his .270/.377/.589 line in Triple-A – a line, mind you, that made him the fifth-best hitter in the International League while also being the youngest player in that league to even reach 300 plate appearances. 

The breakout call doesn't have much to hang on from his time in the majors, as Basallo naturally looked pretty overmatched. And, as is often the case with young catchers, it might take him a while to figure things out against MLB competition. But the upside here simply cannot be ignored. He put up a 94.2 mph average exit velocity (with a max of 115.9, both elite marks) at Triple-A without striking out even 24% of the time, and he did it while putting that power into action in games, hitting 23 homers in just 76 games. He should be in the lineup most days at either catcher or DH and has the upside to be the No. 1 player at the position if all goes right. As a No. 2 catcher, he's well worth the risk. 

Cade Smith, RP, Guardians

All that's left, really, is to see Smith do it for a full year as the closer. He has two seasons under his belt in the majors with a 2.42 ERA and 35.1% strikeout rate, but we only have a few months of him actually serving as the closer to go on. I have no concerns about his ability to live up to the job, and I think his ceiling is as high as literally any reliever in baseball on a Guardians team that has consistently created enough save volume for 40-plus saves. He has the opportunity; now all he has to do is go out there and take advantage of it. 

The star leap

Jackson Holliday, 2B, Orioles

I wish I had something concrete to point to with Holliday to explain the enthusiasm. He was much better in 2025 than 2024, but he also struggled mightily down the stretch, putting up just a .641 OPS in the second half. When you look under the hood, nothing really stands out, either good or bad – he's got a pretty good sense of barrel control and pretty good approach at the plate, but he comes out right around average in most plate discipline measures, including strikeout and walk rates. Similarly, his quality of contact metrics all pretty much come out to average or perhaps even a tick below. If we're just going based on what Holliday has shown at the MLB level, there really isn't very much to get excited about.

The argument here is more for the men of faith than our men of science, in other words. Holliday was the top prospect in baseball not long ago, and he has 857 plate appearances through his age-21 season, one of those 17 players with that many PA at that young of an age. It's worth noting that, among that 17, Holliday ranks just 16th in OPS+ through his age-21 season, ahead of just Elvis Andrus and directly behind Delmon Young. Young never quite figured it out, though he did hit .290 as a 22-year-old and eventually had a 100-RBI season while hitting .298 in 2010; Andrus would go on to be a Fantasy stalwart, though more for his speed than his bat outside of a few double-digit homer seasons. 

Getting this much playing time at Holliday's precocious age doesn't guarantee superstardom, in other words. But he more or less held his own in the majors last season, at a time when most prospects, even very good ones, are just being challenged for the first time in the high-minors. Including Holliday here requires a leap of faith. But it's a kind of bet that often works out. 

Luke Keaschall, 2B, Twins

Here's what it comes down to: I believe in the speed. Keaschall is fast (85th percentile sprint speed), but more than that, he's opportunistic. He knows how to get on base, he knows when to pick his spots, and at least last season, he had a blaring green light. And that was true both in the majors, where he ran at a 45-steal pace, and in Triple-A, where he had a 64-steal pace. I don't think it's realistic to expect anything like a 60-steal pace over a full season, but 40 seems like a reasonable expectation at the top of the Twins lineup. 

The biggest question I have about Keaschall comes down to power. Is he just a Nico Hoerner type with worse contact skills? I don't think the .302 average he had last season will prove sustainable, but I don't expect him to be a terrible source of average – he hit .294 in the minors and had a very strong 14% strikeout rate as a rookie. But he doesn't hit the ball particularly hard and, at least in the majors, didn't hit the ball to the pull side in the air often, which is how an otherwise punchless hitter would put the ball in the seats. 

However, there was some hope that he would develop at least above-average power back in his prospect days, especially on pull-side fly balls, and it's worth noting that he was returning from Tommy John surgery at the end of 2024 and then missed over three months with a fractured arm just a few weeks into his rookie season. There could be a bit more juice left to squeeze here, and if he has a 20-homer ceiling to go along with his speed and contact skills, we could very quickly be talking about a top-three guy at second base. 

Ryan Pepiot, SP, Rays

The thing about Tropicana Field is that pitches seem to move differently there, or maybe it would be more accurate to say that Tropicana Field, by dint of being the only truly domed stadium in baseball, is the part where pitches move the way they are supposed to in a neutral environment. Everywhere else, you've gotta deal with changes in wind or humidity based on the time of day, but Tropicana is a truly climate-controlled environment, one that has always benefited pitchers. 

Pepiot didn't really suffer from the year he pitched in Steinbrenner Field, going from a 3.60 ERA in 2024 to a 3.87 mark in 2025. But he lost a couple points of strikeout rate, mostly because his four-seamer was just a bit less effective than it had been the year before, when he was pitching at Tropicana. Where he'll be pitching roughly half his games in 2026. You get where I'm going with this. 

Because Pepiot is so reliant on his four-seamer for success, he might be uniquely well-suited to pitch in Tropicana, where he has a 28% strikeout rate for his career. And now he's back there with another year of development under his belt and no reason to think the Rays will play any games with his innings after he got to nearly 170 in 31 starts last season. I expect the best season of Pepiot's career in 2026.