2026 Fantasy Baseball Sleepers: Catcher

Welcome to a brand new series at RotoWire which features our favorite sleepers by position. Over the next two weeks, we'll share three sleepers and one deep sleeper at every position on the diamond. For the purposes of this series, here's how we're defining "sleeper" and "deep sleeper":

• Sleeper: a player being drafted between picks 150 and 350 who could significantly outperform his draft price
• Deep Sleeper: a player being drafted after pick 350 who could significantly outperform his draft price

Let's jump right into it with the top catcher sleepers for your 2026 fantasy baseball drafts.

Note: the average draft position in this article is taken from all Draft Champions leagues which have drafted over the past month.

Best 2026 Catcher Sleepers 

Samuel Basallo (ADP 179, C 15)

In a one-catcher league, where serviceable catchers are available on waivers throughout the season, I would be comfortable waiting until very late in the draft and targeting Basallo. He's arguably the player with the widest range of possible outcomes in all of baseball this year, and while the downside of him being stuck in the minors or in a backup role means I'd be nervous to roster him in a deep, two-catcher league where the alternatives on the wire are very poor, the upside here is too high to be ignored.

Basallo's .966 OPS at the Triple-A level was tied for fifth among all hitters with at least 300 plate appearances at the level, and the four hitters above him were all at least 25 years old. Basallo was just 20, yet he slashed .270/.377/.589 with 23 homers in 76 games. A premium prospect, the Orioles should have every incentive to give him as much playing time as he can earn. His combination of top-tier raw power and decent enough contact (23.7 percent strikeout rate at Triple-A, 25.4 percent in the majors) should be good enough to earn at-bats anywhere, let alone behind the plate.

Basallo's bat will have to prove good enough to earn at-bats somewhere other than catcher if he's to pay off his sleeper potential, however, and not just because his glove is sub-par. Adley Rutschman is still the Orioles' primary backstop and should hold onto the role despite a downward trend the last two seasons. Pete Alonso is locked in as the everyday first baseman, so if Basallo wants to carve out more than a backup catcher job, it will have to come by beating out Tyler O'Neill and Ryan Mountcastle to become the primary designated hitter. That should be easy enough for the player Basallo is eventually supposed to become, but the .165/.229/.330 line he managed in his 31-game debut last season suggests he won't be handed the role without a fight.

Carter Jensen (ADP 204, C 17)

Jensen is generating plenty of sleeper buzz after flashing his potential at the plate last September, hitting .300/.391/.550 with three homers in 69 trips to the plate. A repeat of numbers quite that good would be a surprise, but Jensen was a highly-rated prospect (he's technically still prospect-eligible and is ranked 34th on our Top 400 Prospects list) whose strongest tool is his power, so the hot month didn't come out of nowhere.

For Jensen to live up to his sleeper potential, the Royals will need to find a way to get him and Salvador Perez into the same lineup most games, but they've already demonstrated a willingness to do so. Over the last 14 games of last year, Jensen made 13 starts (seven at catcher at six at DH) while Perez made 14 (six at catcher, seven at DH and one at first base). Nobody the Royals added this winter looks like a threat to that tandem in the DH spot this season.

Jensen will also need to avoid swing-and-miss issues if he's going to live up to his promise. His 17.4 percent strikeout rate in his brief debut suggests that won't be a problem, but he did have a 28.3 percent strikeout rate in Triple-A and a 32 percent mark in winter ball. While his batting average may come way down over the course of a full season if the strikeout problems resurface, he has enough power to be a productive fantasy option as long as he's making enough contact to continue playing regularly. His 20.8 percent barrel rate was 11th in baseball in the month of September (min. 60 plate appearances). 

Dillon Dingler (ADP 222, C 19)

Unlike the two catchers discussed above, Dingler won't pad his plate appearance total with regular starts as the designated hitter. He started just three games in that spot last year and doesn't appear to have a path to regular DH at-bats this year, with Kerry Carpenter expected to fill that spot most games. That won't be a problem for Dingler, whoever, whose combination of excellent defense and an uninspiring backup (Jake Rogers) should make him one of the leaders in games caught again this season. He was fifth in the league with 113 games started behind the plate last year.

That stable playing time makes Dingler a high-floor second catcher option, but it also gives him the platform he needs to showcase his sleeper potential. While he was never an elite prospect, peaking at 145 here at RotoWire, his performance in his first full season last year represented an encouraging start to his career.

Dingler's 23.5 percent strikeout rate was a touch worse than league average, but he nonetheless managed a .278 batting average and an even better .290 xBA, thanks in large part to the fact that he hits the ball quite hard, as seen in his 45.6 percent hard-hit rate and 9.2 percent barrel rate. The potential for some power gains beyond his 13 homers from last year to go alongside a pretty good batting average makes Dingler a real sleeper this year, with a fallback plan of being a steady compiler thanks to his strong glove.

Deep Sleeper

Harry Ford (ADP 404, C31)

Ford had no path to regular at-bats while stuck behind Cal Raleigh in Seattle, but a December trade to Washington makes him one of this year's most interesting catcher sleepers. The 2021 12th-overall pick is a fairly well-liked prospect, peaking at 39th on RotoWire's Top 400 Prospect Rankings last August, and even if he's fallen all the way to 153 on the last update, I still like him quite a bit as a deep sleeper.

Ford's price is suppressed for good reason, however. He's far from a lock to begin the year as the Nationals' starting catcher, as former catcher of the future Keibert Ruiz is still on the roster and is just 27 years old. Ruiz may have struggled to a 68 wRC+ over the last two years, but he had a perfectly respectable 94 wRC+ before that and is under contract through 2030 (with two club options on top of that). The Nationals won't want to just throw Ruiz away, and Ford has options remaining, so this might wind up being nothing more than a name to keep in mind for the second half.

Ford's minor-league numbers make him a gamble worth taking, however. He slashed .283/.408/.460 with 16 homers in 97 Triple-A games last year and showed impressive plate discipline, combining a 16.2 percent walk rate with a 19.2 percent strikeout rate. He also has impressive athleticism for a catcher, to the point that a move to the outfield to get him into the lineup in Seattle was being considered. That athleticism helped him steal 35 bags in 2024, though he dropped to seven steals last year, so there's no guarantee he'll be a speed asset this season. Still, the overall upside should he wind up taking the job from Ruiz either right away or early in the season makes him an appealing target in this range of the draft, and in draft-and-hold formats, pairing Ford and Ruiz as your second and third catcher is worth considering.

Who is your top catcher sleeper for 2026? Let us know in the comments below.