It’s great when you can find an all-around superstar on the free-agent market — but also, no matter what skill set your team needs, there are players out there who match it every offseason.
So let’s find this year’s free-agent position players who have the biggest standout qualities, using baseball’s “five tools” as a guideline: contact hitting, power, speed, glove and arm strength. Some big-name players are off the board already, but there are still plenty of candidates to choose from for each.
Here are the best tools still available on the free-agent market.
Even in a down season by his standards in 2025, Arraez still led the National League in hits (181) and, incredibly, struck out only 21 times all year — the fewest K’s in a full season by a qualified hitter since Tony Gwynn’s 18 in 1998.
Arraez’s minuscule 3.1% strikeout rate this season was more than twice as low as any other qualified hitter this season, and his 5.3% swing-and-miss rate was easily the lowest in the Majors, too. Arraez is simply the best of this era at putting the bat on the ball.
There is also a case for Bo Bichette here, who hit a career-best .311 in 2025, led all current free agents in Statcast’s expected batting average at .298 and gets more out of his contact than Arraez thanks to a hard-hit rate nearly three times higher (49% to 17%). But we’ll go Arraez for his consistently unmatched pure contact ability.
Honorable mention: Bo Bichette
If Kyle Schwarber or Pete Alonso were still free agents, this would go to one of them. Credit to the Phillies and Orioles for securing the two best power tools. But that still leaves the marquee free-agent hitter on the market, Tucker.
The 2025 Silver Slugger is just very consistent from a power hitting standpoint (and consistently very good). Over the last five seasons, Tucker hasn’t just averaged 27 home runs, he’s also posted a .518 expected slugging percentage based on his quality of contact, which puts him inside the top 5% of MLB hitters over that time.
Tucker generates his power numbers by being great at pulling the ball in the air. Tucker hits the ball in the air about two thirds of the time, and the lefty slugger also has a very high rate of pulled air balls specifically, which turn into home runs more easily than any other type of contact.
Honorable mention: Eugenio Suárez
This isn’t the best free-agent class for pure burners, but one player who still has great speed is Bader, even though speed peaks young and he’s entering his age-32 season.
Bader’s sprint speed in 2025 was 28.8 feet per second, which is far above the Major League average of 27 ft/sec. The only free agent who ranked higher, at 29.3 ft/sec, was Lane Thomas, who’s agreed to a deal with the Royals for 2026.
Bader, though, still ranked in the 85th percentile of Major League players in sprint speed, which for him probably has the biggest impact on his range in the outfield, which is superb. Bader also still regularly reaches Statcast’s “elite speed” threshold of 30-plus ft/sec — he recorded 37 such runs in 2025, the most of any free agent and inside the top 20 for all of MLB.
Honorable mention: J.T. Realmuto
Bellinger has one of the best offense-and-defense combinations of any free agent. We’ll focus on the defense.
Belli was the most valuable fielder last season of any free agent in his class, with +9 runs saved from his defense. Just in terms of his range in the outfield, Bellinger was worth +7 Outs Above Average for the Yankees in 2025, tied with the mark Bader put up for the Phillies at the top of the free-agent class.
Bader would be a worthy choice here, too, because he is consistently an excellent outfielder who ranks highly in Statcast’s Fielding Run Value and Outs Above Average metrics every season.
Honorable mention: Harrison Bader
A couple of the stronger outfield arms in the free-agent class have already signed, like Adolis García (91.9 mph average arm strength in 2025). But either way, the biggest standout arm in this class is really behind the plate.
That’s Realmuto, who continues to have the best pop times among Major League catchers when throwing out baserunners. The 34-year-old’s 1.86-second average pop time to second base in 2025 put him on top of Statcast’s leaderboard once again — where Realmuto resides essentially every season.
No one gets the ball to second base faster than Realmuto, and his arm behind the plate makes a big difference in controlling the run game. He’s one of the most valuable catchers in the big leagues when it comes to catching basestealers.
Honorable mention: Miguel Andujar
