Today, FanGraphs released the 2026 ZiPS projections for the Chicago Cubs, courtesy of Dan Szymborski.
Although all projection systems have their strengths and weaknesses, I have generally found ZiPS to be my most preferred set. Not sure why that is, as I haven’t actually ever gone back systematically to see how things played out; but then again, since projection systems are giving you MEDIAN projections, they aren’t actually saying “this is how the season will definitely play out for this guy.” I guess I like that ZiPS gives you a sense of the median, as well as some of the upper and lower percentile outcome possibilities. You see the range for a guy that way.
Anyway, here’s the initial look at the Cubs ZiPS, which loves the Cubs’ positional group about as much as it dislikes the pitching group:
The 2026 ZiPS projections for the Chicago Cubs are now up on @fangraphs.com.blogs.fangraphs.com/2026-zips-pr…
— Dan Szymborski (@dszymborski.fangraphs.com) 2026-01-21T18:10:42.558ZThat infield is ridiculous, and then having just about 3.0 WAR or more at every single position except DH (where, hey, I’m absolutely buying Moises Ballesteros) … yo. That’s a lot of love.
As far as the pitchers go, however, the depth is there, but the impact on the team’s win total would be marginal on these projections.
Keep in mind on the pitching staff: because this is FanGraphs, the WAR calculations are FIP-based, rather than results-based. The Cubs, as an organization, have long targeted “FIP-beating” pitchers, whose ability to limit barrels and hard contact is not entirely reflected in FIP (last year, all of Matthew Boyd, Shota Imanaga, Cade Horton, Colin Rea, and Jameson Taillon’s ERAs blew their FIPs out of the water – much of that is the Cubs’ defense, some of it is Wrigley Field’s park factor, but it’s also because they limited the worst kind of contact).
Just a reminder that the ZiPS system is a purely mathematical system using stats, age, historical comps, etc. There is no scouting involved, no investigation of new pitches, and no narrative explanation for why a guy might obviously be better or worse than his projection.
There will be so much to dig in on with these in the coming days and weeks, but a handful of things that jumped out at me immediately:
ZiPS doesn’t actually hate the Cubs’ pitching staff, by the way, it just sees a whole lot of average, or slightly above or below average. If your positional group is strong enough, you can win 90+ games with a merely average pitching staff. Almost the entire Cubs starting rotation projects to have an ERA just a little under 4.00 (Justin Steele is the only outlier). All of Javier Assad, Ben Brown, and Jordan Wicks are right around 4.00 (with ERA- that are all between 99 and 101). Steele is the only starting pitcher whose 80th percentile outcome is a WAR above 3. Good gravy. ZiPS really sees this starting group as “yeah, fine I guess, but there’s a lot of it!” Something something explains Cubs still being interested in Zac Gallen something something. Hunter Harvey is the big outlier on the reliever side – if he stays healthy, ZiPS sees a dominant year from him. ZiPS is buying Tyler Austin’s transition back to the States in a VERY big way: .245/.328/.459/125 OPS+ as the median (50th percentile) outcome, and a whopping .268/.356/.509/145 as his 80th percentile. Heck, even his 20th percentile outcome is still above league average! (Wut?!) I find it very curious – but extremely encouraging! – that Pete Crow-Armstrong’s 20th percentile outcome at the plate is only slightly below league-average. In other words, even if PCA stinks at the plate this year, relative to his own ability, he might be pretty close to average. And as we know, with his defense and base-running, that’s still a huge contributor. His median projection is close to a repeat of 2025, and his 80th percentile projection is basically like if he’d just continued his first half from 2025 for an entire season. Jonathon Long’s projections are almost identical to Moises Ballesteros’s. We talked recently about how similar the two are as hitters, but I don’t know that I’d go quite as far as ZiPS in overlaying them, so to speak. Would be pretty awesome if Long actually DOES emerge as an equally good hitter this year, eh? Even if only as additional DH depth, just in case Ballesteros gets hurt or struggles? ZiPS sees Alex Bregman and Matt Shaw as almost identical in projected performance this year, with Bregman getting only a slight edge at the plate and in WAR. Obviously the Cubs don’t see it that way, but it’s important to note that, even if they did, signing Bregman STILL created significant value because, as your top bench option, any team would love to have a great player like Shaw. Love seeing an above-league-average offensive projection for Dansby Swanson, whom I still believe has seen some really hard luck results on batted balls the last two seasons.Check it all out for yourself here at FanGraphs.
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