MLB 26-and-under power rankings: Which clubs have the best young players?

A team’s farm system can take a huge hit when a star player like Julio Rodríguez or Michael Harris “graduates,” but that doesn’t make those players magically way older — they just aren’t prospects anymore. J-Rod and Harris, now certified big-league stars, will play 2023 at 22 years old, the same age as (or younger than) many of the top prospects still eligible for your top-100 list of choice. With more and more of the game’s best players arriving in MLB at such an early age, it feels incomplete to assess a team’s future outlook by strictly looking at how good their prospect-eligible players are or project to be.

This limitation inspired the following project from the FOX Sports MLB staff ahead of the 2023 season: rank every team based on its 26-and-under talent. We’re counting down from 30 to 1 in the weeks leading up to Opening Day.

No. 10 St. Louis Cardinals
No. 9 San Diego Padres
No. 8 Tampa Bay Rays
No. 7 Los Angeles Dodgers
No. 6 Seattle Mariners
No. 5 Toronto Blue Jays
No. 4 Cleveland Guardians
No. 3 Baltimore Orioles
No. 2 Atlanta Braves
No. 1 ??? (It’s Houston!)