Predicting the Best Player Each NL West Team Will Add for 2026
One bold move that each team in the NL West can make at the Winter Meetings that would shake up this division in 2026.
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As we march on through the 2025-2026 offseason, there’s been a fair amount of action ahead of the annual Winter Meetings. Four players accepted qualifying offers, Ryan Helsley, Cedric Mullins, Phil Maton, Dylan Cease, Devin Williams, and Josh Naylor (and a few others) all signed new contracts. So far, we’ve even had a few significant trades!
Now that the Winter Meetings are nearing, the action level is only going to ramp up. This is the prime time of year where front office decision makers, players, and agents all get together and discuss free agent contracts and/or trades. It’s not going to be a surprise to see a few more big names come off the board between now and Dec. 10 when the meetings wrap up.
For now, though, all we’ve got is the rumor mill to rely on. We know Bo Bichette and Kyle Schwarber’s markets are heating up and that they could both secure a payday in the coming days, and we know that MacKenzie Gore is likely to be moved shortly. Outside of that, it’s anybody’s guess what’s about to go down.
Inspired by Mark Feinsand of MLB.com’s “finding a perfect free-agent match for every team” article that was recently published, we’re launching our own mini-series of pieces that follows this idea.
Just Baseball’s editorial staff got together and identified which players (free agents or trade acquisitions) are the perfect fits for every team in the league. Of course, each player can only be named once and these need to be as realistic as possible so we can brag afterwards about being right all along.
Another caveat, is that no player can be returning to their 2025 squad. So in the National League West, the division I’ll be looking at shortly, you’re not going to see Zac Gallen return to the Diamondbacks, Justin Verlander return to the Giants, or Michael King return to the Padres.
The NL West should be a fun one once again in 2026. The Dodgers and Padres are going to once again battle for the top spot while the Giants and Diamondbacks are both strong candidates to field a contending team. The Rockies will also play baseball.
Let’s dive in.
Dodgers Aim High For Bullpen Help, Sign Edwin Díaz
The Dodgers are in position to frustrate fans all over the world by throwing their money around and landing basically any of the best-available free agents this winter. In signing Díaz, they’d be upgrading their bullpen with the very best arm on the market and accomplishing one of the very few goals they’ll realistically have this offseason.
Díaz, 31, has been baseball’s best relief pitcher for nearly a decade now, and that doesn’t look likely to change anytime soon. While he lost the 2023 season to injury and came back in 2024 looking like a different pitcher, he bounced back in a big way this past season and silenced any naysayers.
In 62 games for the Mets in 2025, Díaz recorded the final out in 48 of them while earning 28 saves along the way. He remained a strikeout machine as well, punching out 13.3 batters per nine innings and coming just two short of 100 for what would’ve been the third time in his career.
Now, Díaz is in line for a major payday, even if it means his next team will have to sign him into his mid-to-late 30s. The right-hander was our 10th-ranked free agent this winter and is being predicted to sign a four-year, $80 million. A $20 million AAV is going to be next to nothing for the Dodgers, even when they’ve already got five other players making at least that in 2026 alone.
Tanner Scott (23) and Alex Vesia (5) led the Dodgers in saves in 2025, and Scott’s still projected to be their primary closer by FanGraphs’ RosterResource. Scott made 61 appearances for the team but was left off of the postseason roster(s) entirely and finished his year with a 4.74 ERA (88 ERA+) and 4.70 FIP. That’s not what a first-place team like the Dodgers wants at the back-end of their bullpen. It’s not difficult to see where the club would benefit from adding Díaz.
Giants Land Their ‘Modestly Priced’ Starter in Merrill Kelly
Even though the Giants only won 81 games this past season, I’m not convinced they don’t have a surprise run in them for next season. Their lineup could use some work, but a full season of Bryce Eldridge should be fun to watch. On the pitching side of things, there are multiple spots up for grabs in the bullpen and Justin Verlander’s departure in free agency has left the starting rotation looking barren.
The Giants are fits, at least on paper, for basically every single starting pitcher left on the market. Multiple high-end decision makers, including chairman Greg Johnson and general manager Zack Minasian, have made it known that the organization is not likely going to sign pitchers to long-term deals. ESPN’s Buster Olney recently echoed that, saying that the club is looking for arms that are more modestly priced.
Obviously this means Framber Valdez, Ranger Suárez, and perhaps someone like Michael King or Zac Gallen are off the table. Instead, how about looking a tier down and going after someone like Merrill Kelly?
The Giants are plenty familiar with Kelly by now, as he spent the first seven years of his MLB career in the NL West on the Diamondbacks. The 37-year-old is not likely going to command a significant financial commitment this offseason and has a lengthy track record of consistency and durability. The Giants could easily have him be this offseason’s version of Justin Verlander.
Since first cracking into the league at 30 years old back in 2019, Kelly has made 30 or more starts four times in a seven-year career. The right-hander isn’t a high-strikeout flamethrower like most other pitchers nowadays, but he makes his living as a six-pitch pitcher whose offerings rarely top 94 mph.
This past year alone, Kelly threw five different pitches 200 or more times, with his changeup (26.5%, .203 AVG), four-seam fastball (22.9%, .212 AVG), and cutter (20.5%, .181 AVG) being the three most frequently used of the bunch. He’s fresh off of a 32-start campaign in which he split time between the Diamondbacks and Rangers and his combined 117 ERA+ put his overall production on the mound at 17% above league average.
There’s little to nothing flashy about Kelly, but he’s a solid and reliable pitcher who teams know exactly what they’re getting into. Just Baseball predicted he would land a two-year, $36 million ($18 million AAV) contract this winter and he was our 17th-ranked free agent.
Justin Verlander Stays in the Division, Goes From Giants to Padres
There seems to be a match made in heaven between Justin Verlander and the San Diego Padres this offseason. Verlander, who will be 43 by the time Opening Day rolls around, is coming off of a good-not-great year with the Giants, but he was incredible in the second half.
The future Hall of Famer’s 2.99 second-half ERA was good for 11th in baseball, higher than the likes of Bryan Woo, Garrett Crochet, Tyler Glasnow, and many other notable pitchers. You’d be forgiven if you thought Verlander was getting close to the end after struggling in 2024 and coming out of the gates in 2025 still riding the struggle bus.
Instead, he turned his fortunes around, and now he’s a candidate to earn another guaranteed contract, most likely of the single-year variety.
The Padres, for those who don’t know, need starting pitching more than they need air this offseason. Nick Pivetta is returning in 2026 to lead the charge, but a freshly-uninjured Joe Musgrove will occupy the No. 2 spot, and he’s a wild-card as of right now. Behind them is the trio of Randy Vásquez, JP Sears, and Kyle Hart. There’s not much to write home about here.
The moral of the story is that there’s a spot with Verlander’s name all over it. With the Padres looking to trim payroll where they can, a one-year deal in the $10-$15 million range should be within the club’s financial parameters. If he can build off of the great second half showing he had in 2025, that deal may end up looking like a steal.
With Verlander’s career undoubtedly coming close to a conclusion, he’s only going to want to sign with a contender from here on out. The good news for him is that these Padres just won 90 games this past year, and they’ve got both a killer lineup and bullpen. Now they just need that starter…
Diamondbacks Beef Up Their Lineup, Sign Kazuma Okamoto
The Diamondbacks traded one of baseball’s most prolific power hitters in Eugenio Suárez away at the 2025 trade deadline, and they’ve sorely needed some thump in their lineup ever since. Suárez wound up hitting 49 home runs this past year (36 of them coming with Arizona in just 106 games), and is now a free agent himself, but this exercise says we can’t have anyone rejoining their 2025 teams.
In the first half of this past season, Suárez carried the Dbacks to a fourth-place ranking on MLB’s home run leaderboard. After his departure at the deadline, they fell to 19th. That says a lot about how much they valued his bat, and how badly they need a new face to hit bombs for them on a nightly basis moving forward.
That leaves the door open for the Diamondbacks to pursue 29-year-old Kazuma Okamoto, who’s already been posted by Japan’s Yomiuri Giants (Nov. 19) and is right in the middle of the 45-day window with which teams can negotiate with him.
This offseason’s got a lot of hype surrounding players making the leap from overseas and coming to MLB, but Okamoto has fallen to the side in the shadow of Tatsuya Imai and Munetaka Murakami, both of whom should get larger deals on the open market than Okamoto. That fact alone may just work in the Diamondbacks’ favor.
Okamoto has played for the Giants since 2015 when he was just 19 years of age. Since then, he’s turned into one of the most fearsome power hitters on the planet, and that’s exactly what the Dbacks could use in their lineup as they look to bounce back in 2026.
Just this past season, Okamoto hit 15 home runs in 69 games but he’s shown over the years that he’s got some wild light-tower-power. From 2018, here’s his home runs per season:
- 2018: 33 (143 games)
- 2019: 31 (143 games)
- 2020: 31 (118 games)
- 2021: 39 (143 games)
- 2022: 30 (140 games)
- 2023: 41 (140 games)
- 2024: 27 (143 games)
That sustained run of power output should have teams salivating. What makes Okamoto special is the fact that he pairs this raw power with an outstanding eye and sense of pitch recognition at the plate. He routinely sports high walk rates while simultaneously keeping his strikeout rates down. Just this past year, he had an 11.3 BB% and K% for the Giants.
As of right now, the Dbacks are predicted to have Jordan Lawlar get everyday reps at third base, with Pavin Smith as the club’s starting first baseman. There’s nothing necessarily wrong with either of these options, but they both come with their fair share of warts. Okamoto can play both infield corners (although he is more of a first baseman than a third baseman) and would be able to hold down a starting gig at either corner for the Snakes.
The Dbacks are going to want to do what they can to at least hang with the Dodgers and Padres in the NL West come 2026. They’ve got a ton of big names on the payroll and have long wanted to break into the Japanese market. Looks like we’ve found a way to do just that.
Rockies Add a Bat, Acquire Nick Castellanos From Phillies
Look, the Rockies need to acquire somebody here, okay?
This isn’t just me throwing a bunch of names up and seeing who sticks though.
The Phillies have been wanting to move on from Nick Castellanos for a while now, and the Rockies feel like a team that could take him off of the Phillies’ hands while also being a team that could legitimately use him. Hypothetically, the Rockies could take on Castellanos’ $20 million contract in 2026 and use that to get the Phillies to attach a meaningful prospect as a thanks for taking Castellanos.
Most of the Rockies’ big boppers from this past season swung the bat from the right side, highlighted by breakout star Hunter Goodman and supported by outfielders Jordan Beck and Brenton Doyle. Mickey Moniak, a left-handed bat, had the second-most home runs on the club with 24, but there’s no guarantee that power output stays beyond 2025.
Over in Philadelphia, Castellanos has hit 23 or more home runs in two of the past three years, but he only hit 17 in 2025 while seeing his wRC+ dip below league average, down to 95. His fWAR also came in at -0.6, which is the lowest he’s had in his career. Phillies fans are more than ready for him to take a long walk off a short pier, especially because he has zero defensive value and has had some dustups with management during his tenure on the team.
While he didn’t do this all that well this past season, Castellanos has historically been a lefty masher, as evidenced by his 124 wRC+ against southpaws in 2024 versus a 97 against right-handers. The year before that, he was at 147 vs. LHP and 93 against RHP. There’s some history there.
The Rockies are by no means going to be chasing victories in 2026, but they’ve got to at least field a team made up of real human beings. If they’re able to pull off a deal with the Phillies where they can land a prospect alongside Castellanos in exchange for taking on his whole 2026 salary, things start to make a bit more sense.
In the past, the Rockies have been a team that’s been willing to sweeten deals to get overpaid players of their roster (see: Nolan Arenado). This time around, we’d see the fortunes turn the other way for them.
To make matters just a bit more interesting, Castellanos recently went on record to say that he’s willing to learn to play first base if it drives up his value to teams. The Rockies just non-tendered Micahel Toglia and have no certainty at that position heading into 2026. He may not be an ideal fit, but he can always just serve as the team’s DH if they’re that concerned with the defense.
Look, it’s not perfect. But if you squint hard enough, there’s a universe where this fit actually makes a lot of sense. The Rockies get a veteran bat that could hit anywhere from 20 to 30 home runs for them in 2026 and a decent prospect, while the Phillies get out from under Castellanos’ contract. Everybody’s happy.
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Eric Treuden (troy-din) is one of Just Baseball's Managing Editors and Facebook manager. After previous stops at FanSided's news desk, Yardbarker, and Jays Journal, he has…