The 2026 MLB season is almost here and that means you’re likely prepping for your fantasy baseball draft. One of the best ways to prepare is to do as many mock drafts as possible. Of course, sometimes it’s tough to find an accurate representation of your league settings by using the public mock draft lobby.
Not to fear! If you’re a Yahoo Fantasy+ subscriber, you have access to the Instant Mock Draft tool, allowing you to practice your draft in seconds. You can test different strategies, pick from various draft slots and experiment with roster construction as many times as you want, anytime, instantly. Now is a great time to subscribe to Yahoo Fantasy+, so you can use the wealth of tools for your draft prep.
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In this series, we’re going to be using the Instant Mock Draft tool to pick from each of the 12 slots in a 12-team fantasy baseball league. In this piece, we’ll be drafting from the No. 6 pick and using Fred Zinkie’s “OPS Floor” strategy, as featured in his easy-to-execute draft strategies for 2026.
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Note: We’re using Yahoo’s default points league settings for these mock drafts.
Full Roster
C: Drake Baldwin, Braves (2025 OPS: .810)
1B: Freddie Freeman, Dodgers (.869)
2B: Gleyber Torres, Tigers (.745)
SS: Jose Ramírez, Guardians (.863)
3B: Brendan Donovan, Mariners (.775)
OF: Kyle Schwarber, Phillies (.928)
OF: Yordan Alvarez, Astros (.797)
OF: Seiya Suzuki, Cubs (.804)
UTIL: Luis Robert Jr., Mets (.661)
UTIL: Spencer Torkelson, Tigers (.789)
SP: Logan Gilbert, Mariners
SP: Dylan Cease, Blue Jays
RP: David Bednar, Yankees
RP: Trevor Megill, Brewers
P: Ryan Pepiot, Rays
P: Spencer Strider, Braves
P: Aaron Nola, Phillies
P: Jack Leiter, Rangers
Bench: Kazuma Okamoto, Blue Jays (.992 in Japan)
Bench: J.T. Realmuto, Phillies (.700)
Bench: Giancarlo Stanton, Yankees (.944)
Bench: Reid Detmers, Angels
Bench: Caleb Durbin, Red Sox (.721)
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Again, we entered this draft with a goal of acquiring mostly players with an OPS of .800 or greater from 2026. The entire roster can’t fit that mold, of course, so anyone whose OPS was under .800 last season at least has a history of reaching that mark in their career at some point (Alvarez, Robert, Torres). Or they’re a younger player who could improve from last season’s results (Torkelson, Durbin).
Before we dive deeper into my mindset for this mock, we’ll go over the Ramírez pick.
Zinkie hates J-Ram this season because the Guardians don’t offer a quality offense and at some point, Ramírez has to regress, right? Well, in terms of this strategy, Ramirez is the gold standard. He has a career .857 OPS in 13 seasons. Is he the sexiest pick in the first round? Definitely not. But I don’t think he regresses enough where it kills your season.
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Five players in my starting lineup had an OPS of .800 or better last season. So we’ll go over the outliers a bit and the thinking around that. Second base was tough once you get past the first few rounds. Only two players met the OPS requirements from last season (Ketel Marte, Jazz Chisholm Jr.). So I waited a bit and went with Torres, who had an .800 OPS a few seasons ago with the Yankees. He’s also surprisingly only 29 years old. Donovan was another middle infielder I was eyeing. He’s also 29 and was top-five in OPS among 2B in 2025. Perhaps a move to Seattle in a better offensive environment will boost him above the threshold.
Alvarez and Robert are both bounce-back candidates I’ve discussed in previous mocks. If you take out last season, when Alvarez was injured, his career OPS is an insane .978 over the six previous seasons. When healthy, he’s one of the best hitters in baseball. That said, it was risky selecting him in the fourth round. I would have liked him to drop a bit. Robert heads to New York where he’ll be a part of what should be a very good Mets lineup. Injuries have been an issue but in 2023, Robert was an All-Star and had an .857 OPS. He’s also only 28 years old.
Tork and Durbin don’t meet the requirements but are both still young, each 26 years old. Tork has a shot at reaching .800 OPS for the first time in his career and has a lot of pop with 30+ homers in two of the past three seasons. Durbin played well for the Brewers as a rookie in 2025 with a 2.8 WAR. He has a low strikeout rate and heads to a hitter-friendly stadium in Fenway Park.
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It was over in Japan, but Okamoto has reached the .800 OPS threshold in every season since 2018. He’s also a part of a solid Toronto lineup. Stanton is Stanton. He’s not going to be healthy all season but when he’s at the plate, he’s one of the most feared hitters in baseball. He may struggle to reach 100 games but I know I’m getting a high OPS while he’s out there. Realmuto is the weakest of this bunch but he’s my backup catcher, so it’s not an overly important role (I can stream some options). Also, he did have an .820 OPS not too long ago in 2022.
We’ll go over pitching next because I really like how the staff shook out. I was able to grab a couple of high-end starters in Gilbert and Cease, both at the top of the rotation for good teams. Bednar has a chance to lead the AL in saves. I wanted to pair Megill with Abner Uribe but wasn’t able to. Again, not the end of the world; we can stream RPs. Leiter has a lot he needs to improve but he’s got a high pedigree and is still young, set to turn 26 in April. Pepiot should benefit from the park change, while Strider and Nola are similar to Alvarez and Robert — both bounce-back candidates at SP.
Takeaways: This was a lot of fun. We’re halfway through this series and this was my favorite mock yet. You have to do more prep work to figure out targets based on OPS but that isn’t that heavy a lift. The J-Ram-Schwarber 1-2 punch as my offensive anchors feels very solid and it doesn’t really feel like this roster has any holes, maybe up the middle and at catcher. I highly recommend this strategy and again, be sure to check out the rest of Fred’s ways to attack your draft here.
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