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Drafts are happening right now. We've done a few mock drafts ourselves here at FBT HQ – a Roto draft here and then one for H2H points here – but there are also real drafts that will matter for 2026 happening elsewhere. Over at the NFBC platform, for example, they've had 156 drafts completed already! 

And while a lot of those drafts are of the Draft-and-Hold variety that require a different approach to team-building than your typical 12-team leagues with IL spots and deep benches, they are still real-life drafts from real-life Fantasy players -- often some of the most fanatical and knowledgeable players out there. It might be a slightly different context than the drafts we'll be doing come February and March, but there's still plenty to be learned from the results of these early drafts, and you can find the ADP data here. 

Plus, these early drafts will, to a large extent, set the market for players. That isn't true across the board – for example, elite closer prices tend to be dramatically higher in these drafts because getting role certainty has extra value this far out from Spring Training – but it is generally true that where guys are valued early in the winter will influence where they go off the board in the spring. Which means we can already start to figure out who might be good targets and who might be worth fading. We'll get to the fades later this week, but today, we're focusing on the best values in these early drafts. The market might catch up to some of these players, but that's okay, because I'm trying to identify 10 players I'd be happy to pay an even higher price than their current one. 

Scott White and I are still keeping track of the Hot Stove marketplace in our Fantasy Baseball Offseason tracker, which has been updated this week with a few trades plus Jorge Polanco, Kenley Jansen, Robert Suarez, and Pete Alonso's signings, so make sure you bookmark that for the rest of the offseason. We'll be updating that throughout the upcoming holidays, but this newsletter will be taking a little two-week hiatus after one more post later this week. We'll be back in January with my full rankings for 2026 and more to get you ready for your 2026 drafts. For now, here are 10 players I'm buying at their current price. 

10 early ADP values

Ben Rice, C/1B, Yankees (66.4)

When you're talking about this range of the draft, the difference between "Yeah, I love this price" and "Oooh, this price makes me feel a little itchy" is often pretty small. Where Rice is going right now, I think, is acceptable and even provides some room for profit, but if he shoots up another round or so, it'll get a lot tougher to make that case. 

And I do expect Rice's price to continue to rise. Everyone else in the Fantasy Baseball world is able to see what we all like about Rice – that he's a catcher-eligible bat who might just perform like an impact first baseman. If he can pull that trick off and hit .280 with 30-plus homers in a good Yankees lineup, he could represent one of the clearest edges you can find in a Fantasy lineup in 2026 – he already hit 26 homers in just 530 plate appearances last season, with an expected batting average of .290, so that's really not that outlandish. 

But if you really want Rice on your team in 2026, I do have one suggestion: It might be time to dip your toes into the early draft pool. Because I suspect this will be the cheapest Rice will be all draft season. Precisely because the reasons for liking Rice are as obvious as they are, there's going to be a race to pick him in every draft, and that's inevitably going to lead to some inflation – it already is, as his price has gone from 66.4 in November drafts to 58.8 in December if these trends continue … Aaaaaayyyy.

Jackson Merrill, OF, Padres (69.6)

If you'll allow me some fun with arbitrary endpoints …

Through June 14, Merrill was hitting .304/.349/.474 and was on pace for 18 homers, 88 runs, and 96 RBI for the season. Then he went on the IL with a concussion, and though he returned a week later, Merrill clearly wasn't right, hitting .219/.286/.354 through mid-August, when he went on the IL with an ankle injury. That time off served as a reset for Merrill, and wouldn't you know it, he came back on Sept. 1 and put up a .946 OPS in the final month of the season, on the strength of a power surge that was missing earlier in the season.

Add it all up, and it sure sounds like a case of Merrill's season being derailed by a concussion, only to get back on track once he took a bit of extra time to get right. Would I feel better about Merrill's Fantasy outlook in 2026 if he hadn't suddenly stopped running last season (despite his measured foot speed staying steady from 2024)? Absolutely. But this is a chance to bet on a soon-to-be 23-year-old everyone thought was fated to be a second-round pick for the next decade, this time a year ago at a discounted price. I'll make that bet every time in the fifth or sixth round.

Geraldo Perdomo, SS, Diamondbacks (79.1)

I thought Perdomo might end up a triple-digit pick, so at least he isn't being buried quite to that extent. But still, this is quite a discount for a guy who was a top-12 hitter last season. It's reasonable to be skeptical about his chances of a repeat – especially given concerns about the Diamondbacks' lineup if they follow through on plans to trade Ketel Marte. 

But here's the thing: It's not like Perdomo massively over-performed in 2025. His .370 wOBA outran his .355 xwOBA, but not by a margin that suggests it was a total fluke – He was the 46th biggest overperformer by wOBA-minus-xwOBA, but by a smaller margin than names like C.J. Abrams, Jose Ramirez, Freddie Freeman, Cal Raleigh, Jackson Chourio, and more who aren't having it held against them to the same extent. Perdomo doesn't have the multi-year track record some of those names do, but he does have excellent bat control and plate discipline, leading to a high batting average floor and burgeoning power.

Not great power, but enough to matter. He increased his bat speed by 1.4 mph on average in 2025, without increasing his swing length, allowing him to tap into a bit more power, mostly by way of an increased pulled-air rate. I don't expect Perdomo to be a huge power threat, but he doesn't even need to repeat last year's 20 homers to be a nice value at his current price. And if what he did last year was real? He's one of the best values in Fantasy. 

Kyle Bradish, SP, Orioles (89.9)

If all we get from Bradish now that he's healthy is what he did in 2023 – a 2.83 ERA, 1.043 WHIP, and 168 strikeouts in 168.2 innings of work – drafting him will be a success. That's solid No. 2 SP production, not far off from what Joe Ryan (SP16) managed a year ago. It's hard to call a guy with just 71.1 innings over the past two seasons "high floor," but I think it applies here, at least from a performance standpoint. 

But here's the thing: Bradish isn't the same guy he was in 2023. He's a lot better. In those 71.1 innings sandwiched around his Tommy John surgery, Bradish has a 2.65 ERA and 1.05 WHIP with an absolutely elite 34.6% strikeout rate. His 25.9% K-BB% rate in that time is better than every starting pitcher in baseball in 2025, with the exception of Tarik Skubal. 

I don't think it makes sense to project Bradish to be quite that good, and there's plenty of ways for things to go wrong given the lack of workload in recent years. But if the growth he has shown since that 2023 breakout is real, there is definitely top-12 starting pitcher upside. And, unlike some other pitchers who came back from Tommy John last season, Bradish's skills looked mostly intact in his return. I think he's the ace the Orioles have been searching for for years, and he doesn't cost ace prices. Yet. 

Kyle Stowers, OF, Marlins (128.2)

Stowers feels a lot like Brent Rooker when he broke out. An older player who didn't have much of a prospect pedigree, who suddenly broke out rather unexpectedly, but in a way, the underlying data supports. Betting on players like this doesn't always work out, but at this price, it seems worth the risk, because Stowers looked like a legitimate difference maker in 2025. He finished with 25 homers, 61 runs, and 73 RBI in just 117 games, and the underlying data backs it up – his .375 xwOBA is within spitting distance of his actual .386 mark and was a top-20 mark in all of baseball, ahead of names like Kyle Tucker, Nick Kurtz, and Cal Raleigh.

Stowers probably isn't actually a better hitter than those guys. He was a pretty fringe-y prospect who had shown no real ability to handle major-league pitching prior to 2025, and even then, he probably benefited from the Marlins shielding him from the tougher lefties on the schedule. And his success came in a smaller sample size, as an oblique injury ended his season in early August. It would have been nice to get those final two months of data so we could be a bit more confident in Stowers, but that lack of confidence is also why his price is so reasonable. There's some downside with an 11th-round pick in a 12-team league, but I'd argue there's a lot more upside if Stowers works out. 

Luke Keaschall, 2B, Twins (139.1)

I mostly just buy it from Keaschall. The underlying data doesn't quite back up his .302/.382/.445 line as a rookie, but he also doesn't need to hit anywhere close to that line to be worth this price with the way he runs. He stole 14 bases in 49 games as a rookie, and that number grows to 25 in just 77 games if you include his successful time at Triple-A. The Twins clearly gave him the green light to run, and I don't really see much reason to expect that to stop, given how productive he was as a base stealer in the minors. There isn't a ton of pop here, but I think double-digit homers is a reasonable expectation, and the batting average should be at least useful, if not outright good, given his bat-to-ball skills. Given the weakness of second base as a whole, Keaschall's well-rounded skill set and potentially elite stolen base upside makes him one of the more obvious targets at the position. 

Bubba Chandler, SP, Pirates (160.5)

Chandler had a weird 2025. You could reasonably argue he should have been up on the Pirates roster by April, and by the time the summer rolled around, the fact that he wasn't on the roster yet had led some players on the Pirates to reach out to Chandler to apologize on behalf of the team, according to reports. He went into a fairly deep slump as he lost his command deeper into the summer, which then gave the Pirates more of an excuse to hold him down until it became financially advantageous to call him up, and led to some questions about whether he should be viewed as a truly bulletproof prospect.

And then he got up to the majors and eventually reminded us why we were all impatient for him to make his debut. He had one poor outing in his very first start, but still ended up putting up a 21.8% K-BB% rate and 3.60 xERA in his first stint in the majors. The stuff played up as expected, with Chandler putting up a 109 Stuff+ that only six starters bested in 2025 – and that's a stat that should stabilize a lot earlier than many of the more traditional metrics we often use to judge pitchers. There could be some bumps in the road along the way, but I don't see much reason Chandler should be going significantly behind the likes of Nolan McLean (106.6 ADP), Cam Schlittler (129.0), Emmet Sheehan (137.50), or Trey Yesavaga (150.6). I'll take that discount. 

Isaac Paredes, 3B, Astros (187.1)

There are some rumblings that the Astros could look to trade Paredes, given their glut in the corner infield after trading for Carlos Correa to fill Paredes' absence last summer. That's a big deal for a player like Paredes, whose value is tied to having a short left-field wall he can aim for with his pull-heavy swing. And it's a decent reason to be a little skeptical about buying into him – based on Statcast data, Paredes would have hit 22 homers if he played every game in Houston last season, whereas he would have hit just 9-10 in parks as varied as: Baltimore, Cleveland, Kansas City, Los Angeles (Angels), Miami, and St. Louis. Landing in the wrong spot could be hugely detrimental to Paredes' value, and this isn't just idle speculation – he hit just .223/.35/.307 after being traded to the Cubs in 2024. 

Of course, Chicago is an especially poor place for Paredes' skill set, and he did have a 31-homer season in Tropicana Field back in 2023, not an especially great hitter's park. Which is to say, while there's definitely some risk that a trade might harm Paredes' value, I think folks are overreacting here. He was on a 30-homer pace with 170 combined runs and RBI last season, and if he stays in Houston, I think that's a pretty reasonable bet. And while there's some real downside risk if he lands in the wrong spot, he could also end up in Boston, which has reportedly reached out about Paredes, and that would probably keep his value more or less steady. At this price, I'll take the risk. 

Tatsuya Imai, SP, Free Agent (197.7)

If you want a reason to get into some of these early drafts, look at Imai. His price is going to skyrocket once he actually signs, no matter where he signs, but for now, he's being drafted as something like a No. 5 SP for Fantasy. I could see him getting pushed into the top-100 range once we know where he's playing, and I would guess he'll be at least a top-150 pick by the spring. I wrote about Imai's skill set and potential here a few weeks ago, and while I don't necessarily think he's likely to be an ace in MLB, I think he's probably likely to get a pretty similar contract to someone like Framber Valdez (92.8). Based on that alone, we're going to see their prices converge. 

Ivan Herrera, DH, Cardinals (191.4)

It's the "DH" thing that's holding his price back. But here's the thing: Herrera might actually be worth using in Fantasy even if he was just going to be DH-only in 2026. Despite playing through multiple injuries (including the elbow issue that prevented him from catching and ultimately required surgery), Herrera was a phenomenal hitter in 2025. He was 23rd in the majors in wOBA and was actually even better by xwOBA, ranking 20th. And it wasn't even out of nowhere – he put up a .367 xwOBA in 2024, just four points south of his mark from 2025. 

Herrera is just a great hitter, and the only real mark against him is that DH-only tag. He is expected to play catcher in 2026; however, he should ditch that tag fairly early on in 2026, and he probably has a top-five catcher upside if he stays healthy. Especially since he'll almost certainly log plenty of time at DH when he isn't catching. The case for Herrera is very similar to the case for Ben Rice, except he'll go off the boards 10 rounds later. You'll have to draft an extra catcher and hold them until Herrera gains eligibility there, but given the depth of the position this season, that isn't even that big of a deal anymore. Just take a late breakout candidate like Carter Jensen and get an extra bite at the apple.