The last part of our State of the Position series is certainly the least. It's not that relief pitchers aren't important for Fantasy – it's not impossible to win in a Roto league without getting at least a decent number of saves, but you're putting yourself in a real hole if you aren't competing there. The problem is that "competing" in saves doesn't necessarily mean "investing a lot in the position."
Of the 11 relievers who were drafted in the top 100 on average in 2026, you could make a very good argument that only Mason Miller, Cade Smith, Jhoan Duran, David Bednar, and Aroldis Chapman really paid off. Edwin Diaz, Devin Williams, Ryan Helsley, Daniel Palencia, and Jeff Hoffman all either lost their jobs or dealt with injuries (or both in some cases), while Andres Munoz just kind of slogged through the season; 28 saves is okay, but not for the premium you paid for him. And the next few off the board weren't much better – Raisel Iglesias had a typically effective season. Still, Pete Fairbanks, Carlos Estevez, Ryan Walker, and Dennis Santana were all pretty much disasters at a pretty costly price point.
And the thing is: This is pretty typical for relievers. Pitchers are hard enough to predict, given the year-to-year volatility in production and the inherently high injury risk they all carry. But relievers are even worse because you're not just trying to predict performance (based on inherently small sample sizes), but you're also trying to project job security. Whose manager trusts them to weather the storm of a few bad weeks and whose will jump ship at the first sign of rough seas? That is often what separates the good closers from the bad ones, even more than performance itself.
This all makes relievers the most volatile assets in Fantasy. There is very little year-to-year correlation between rankings here, and one year's breakout success story can very easily be next year's massive disappointment. You can try to counter that by paying up for the few sure things at the position, or you can try to play the volume game with your late-round picks and the waiver wire. You need saves, after all. But there's just no good way to guarantee them.
If you missed the rest of the State of the Position series, hey, it's okay, I know the World Series was distracting you. I don't take it personally. The good news is, you can read all of them here to kick off your offseason in earnest:
State of the Position series
2026 Relief Pitcher Review
- Mason Miller, SDP: 70 - 5 - 1.67 - 0.90 - 129 - 38
- Cade Smith, CLE: 74 - 6 - 1.95 - 0.96 - 107 - 41
- Jacob Latz, TEX: 72 - 3 - 2.13 - 0.81 - 83 - 30
- Louis Varland, TOR: 78 - 5 - 1.27 - 1.00 - 97 - 35
- Bryan Baker, TBR: 62 - 4 - 1.44 - 0.91 - 63 - 41
- Grant Taylor, CHW: 84 - 7 - 2.25 - 1.07 - 106 - 10
- Mason Montgomery, PIT: 68.1 - 6 - 2.88 - 1.03 - 105 - 18
- David Bednar, NYY: 69 - 7 - 2.47 - 1.04 - 76 - 35
- Paul Blackburn, NYY: 85 - 7 - 1.59 - 1.08 - 69 - 1
- Josh Hader, HOU: 44.1 - 4 - 1.01 - 0.76 - 55 - 26
- Jhoan Duran, PHI: 59 - 2 - 1.82 - 0.99 - 84 - 33
- Didier Fuentes, ATL: 73 - 7 - 2.45 - 1.10 - 92 - 3
One thing this highlights is how weird relief pitcher scoring can be over the course of a season. Taylor at least got 10 saves and seven wins, genuinely useful production in those categories. But Blackburn and Fuentes end up here with just eight and 10 combined wins and saves, respectively, which certainly doesn't feel all that impactful. Blackburn is here because that 1.59 ERA is a genuine standout mark over 85 innings, while Fuentes makes it thanks to very good rate stats and the 92 strikeouts.
Fuentes is worth pausing on because I would bet on him being part of Atlanta's rotation plans next season. He has a limited arsenal, which makes it tough to know how he'll handle being a starter, and there will likely be some limitations as the 21-year-old has never thrown even 11 innings in a season – his 90 innings in 2026 across the majors and minors are a career-high to date. But if he's as good as he looked in his relief role (where he often pitched multiple innings), 140 innings could be very valuable from him. The stuff is certainly good enough to play, and if he's in the rotation, he should be on Fantasy radars in all leagues – and would be worth drafting as a top-10 RP in points leagues as a SPaRP (Starting Pitcher as Relief Pitcher).
Biggest Breakout from 2026
Louis Varland, Blue Jays
There are any number of ways you can go here, but I'll stick with Varland, who didn't just take the job and run with it but actually looked like he might be an elite closer. He added a little bit of velocity, which helped his already pretty good fastball play up, but it was the further development of his changeup that might have really helped Varland take the next step. He added a couple of ticks to that pitch while maintaining the roughly 30 inches of drop he had on the pitch prior, which is just a wicked combination when you already have to sit on a 99 mph fastball. The changeup seemed to help the fastball play up, and paired with his already excellent curveball, made him one of the most effective pitchers in baseball in any role. He put up a 1.27 ERA and 2.37 xERA while throwing 78 innings, a huge total for a closer. Varland has shown the ability to be a high-volume pitcher without sacrificing performance, and he should enter 2027 with no question as to his role. He's a top-five closer in Fantasy.
Biggest Bust from 2026
Edwin Diaz, Dodgers
Okay, so maybe the idea here is that we just need to fade whoever the Dodgers sign to be their closer, because Diaz's 2026 season was somehow an even bigger disaster than Tanner Scott's 2025. He lost the job before he needed elbow surgery, and he never really earned it back. Things were a bit better in the postseason, and I don't think Diaz has totally lost the ability to be a high-level closer. Let's not forget that he has had seasons like this before – okay, maybe not this bad, but he posted a 5.59 ERA in 2019 and lost his job with the Mets on multiple occasions before ultimately earning it back. Given the money still owed over the next two seasons, I have to assume Diaz will enter 2027 with the closer job for the Dodgers, which could be a very, very lucrative role. But you'll have to get a big discount off his previous prices to justify the clear risk involved.
Biggest rankings movers from 2026 to 2027
Up: Louis Varland, Blue Jays; Jacob Latz, Rangers; Bryan Baker, Rays; Mason Montgomery, Pirates
Montgomery's breakout wasn't quite as pronounced as either Latz's or Baker's, but I might have more faith in it. It took a while for him to emerge as the Pirates' closer, but by the time he did, he looked like one of the very best pitchers in baseball. He got off to a really rocky start to the season, but by July, he had ditched his changeup entirely, swapped out a bunch of four-seamers to prioritize his sinker, and took off like a rocket. Over his final 38 appearances from June 29 on (when he started introducing the sinker), Latz put up a 1.22 ERA and a 44% strikeout rate, absolutely elite numbers. It's a small sample size we're dealing with, but Montgomery passed the eye test and absolutely has the stuff to be an elite closer. You might have to pay a very, very hefty price to find out if he can repeat it in 2027, but he might be worth it. I might rank him as a top-five closer next season.
I actually identified Latz as a late-round sleeper before the season. With that said, I can't even do a victory lap on that, because I definitely didn't see him emerging as the Rangers' unquestioned closer. There was a bit of a velocity jump – less than 1 mph with the four-seamer, but more with the secondaries – but the pitch-mix mostly held constant. However, it's hard to point to anything obvious underlying his breakout, which makes it kind of tough to make sense of the massive jump in his strikeout rate from 22% to 31% year-over-year. And he did that as a 30-year-old, so skepticism is certainly warranted here, given the relatively small sample size we're dealing with. This feels like a pretty classic one-year-wonder kind of closer, but to be fair, there aren't nearly as many performance-related red flags with Latz as there were with, say, Carlos Estevez this time last year.
Baker wasn't really on Fantasy radars coming into the season, despite the fact that we knew the Rays had a pretty wide-open bullpen situation. That's probably because he had just a 4.06 ERA and 4.01 xERA in 2025, and wasn't appreciably better after getting to the Rays midway through the season. The Rays largely had Baker stop throwing his slider, focusing more on his changeup than ever before. While it isn't a huge swing-and-miss pitch, he commands it well and generates a ton of weak contact, and the fastball is good enough to round out the arsenal. It isn't an obvious ace reliever's approach, and Baker's breakout actually somehow came along with worse strikeout and walk rates than he had in 2025. Which means it mostly came down to limiting hard contact and turning batted balls into outs at a significantly higher rate than he ever had before. That's not an inherently unsustainable approach, but it's prone to significant year-to-year fluctuations. Baker has, as of writing, tossed nine shutout innings in the postseason to give us a slightly larger sample of success to point to, but Baker is another breakout who looks a bit shakier than you might think heading into 2027.
Down: Edwin Diaz, Dodgers; Devin Williams, Mets; Ryan Helsley, Orioles
So, it turns out Williams' struggles in 2025 weren't just a small-sample-size thing. He has a 4.65 ERA over 102.2 innings in the past two seasons, and while his peripherals are much better under the hood, at some point, you stop earning the benefit of the doubt on these things. Given the money and years left on his deal (two years and $30 million, plus about $4 million remaining in signing bonus payments), the Mets probably aren't going to just stick Williams in middle relief forever. But he needs to pitch to his peripherals at some point before he gets another chance to close, I think.
I guess the good news for Helsley is that nobody really emerged as a can't-miss alternative closer in Baltimore's bullpen when he was dealing with injuries. Andrew Kittredge and Rico Garcia are pretty good pitchers, but they probably aren't much better than "pretty good," and Helsley has shown he can be better than that at his best. But he also has a 4.42 ERA over the past two seasons and missed most of the season with elbow issues. Helsley opted into his contract for 2027 and should get a chance to factor into the closer job. He'll likely open Spring Training in direct competition with Felix Bautista, another talented but injury-prone, high-leverage reliever. Helsley could be a very good Fantasy option for 2027, but you can't draft him like he will be one.
Offseason preview
Who needs an upgrade most?
The Yankees seem likely to at least give David Bednar the qualifying offer, and I think it's more likely than not he returns to the club in some capacity. If so, that answers one of these questions. The rest are mostly fringe playoff contenders (at best) who probably have better ways to spend their money than a top-flight closer, but there's definitely a hole across the ninth inning with these teams.
The Marlins are a very interesting one, because they went against their typical approach by giving Pete Fairbanks a big contract last offseason. This move was kind of a disaster as Fairbanks ended up requiring Thoracic Outlet surgery at the end of a frustrating season. The way that went played a role in the Marlins' notable decision to use starters like Sandy Alcantara and Eury Perez in high-leverage relief roles down the stretch during their scheduled bullpen throwing days. It's a fascinating, novel experiment that worked out well – Sandy Alcantara got three saves! – and one I imagine they're at least going to try to follow through in 2027. I don't think this means every single Marlins starting pitcher will throw 20-plus relief innings over the season. But I could see a world where the Marlins supplement the back end of their bullpen with, say, 40 or so innings from starters, which could lessen the need for a proven closer. It's a long shot that it all works out – the best laid plans of bullpens, and all that – but it's something to consider when looking ahead.
One thing worth adding here: We could get a SPaRP-eligible Sandy Alcantara at some point in 2027, and that's no small thing. He would have been the third-highest scoring reliever in 2026 if he were eligible in CBS Fantasy points leagues. He could be a cheat code for those formats, and it could be worth bumping him up a few spots in your rankings for that alone.
Top impending free agents
- David Bednar
- Emilio Pagan*
- Adrian Morejon
- Raisel Iglesias
- Bryan Abreu
- Kenley Jansen**
*Player option for 2027
**Team option for 2027
Morejon might be the most interesting free agent on the market at any position. He has emerged as one of the best relievers in baseball, putting up a 2.58 ERA and 27% strikeout rate over the past three seasons, and he's done it with a legitimate starter's arsenal. Some teams will surely look at the relative success of guys like Michael King and Clay Holmes, who have made the transition from the bullpen to the rotation and will wonder if they can't do the same thing with Morejon. He struggled with injuries back when he was still trying to be a starter, and actually never managed to throw more than 65.1 innings as a starter. That's a pretty big concern, and it might scare teams off that experiment. Of course, if they do, they could just sign him to be a closer, and he could be an elite one if so.
Trade candidates
The biggest Astros names have appeared as trade candidates across this series, but that's total speculation on my part. The Astros feel pretty far from being a contender, but with team owner Jim Crane in charge of baseball operations after parting ways with Dana Brown, it's impossible to say what this team will do. If they do decide to blow it up, Hader would likely fetch a pretty big haul with two years left under contract, especially as he looked as good as ever after returning from a biceps injury early in 2026. Even as his mid-30s loom, Hader looks like one of the very best relievers in the game.
Even as the Padres made the playoffs, there were rumors swirling around Miller at this year's deadline. He might be the best pitcher on the planet on a per-inning basis and still has a couple of cheap arbitration years left, so the Padres are going to receive a huge return if they do decide to trade him. Given their financial situation, that might be the best move, though with Morejon hitting free agency, that would be a big hit to a bullpen that has been a strength of the team for a long time. If Morejon walks and Miller is traded, Bradgley Rodriguez would emerge as one of the top breakout candidates at the position coming off a 2.19 ERA (and 2.37 xERA) in 74 innings in 2026. A name to know, for sure.
