Until this weekend, baseball’s injury list appeared to be empty to begin the 2026 season. Then, starting with Blue Jays catcher Alejandro Kirk on Friday, the stars fell in quick succession. The Cubs lost their two leading rushers, Cade Horton and Matthew Boyd, in back-to-back days. Joining them in the IL are two of the best players in the National League, Mets left fielder Juan Soto and Dodgers shortstop Mookie Betts, and one of the best pitchers in the American League, Astros ace Hunter Brown. Each of the three teams has a share of first place at the moment, making these the most vulnerable.
It’s not unusual for the Mets to be unlucky enough to win for a long time, as this is the curse of this team that knows how to struggle until it’s time for the poem. But that may come later, as Soto’s injury does not appear to be too serious for the three players involved.
Running from first to third on Bo Bichette’s single Friday in San Francisco, Soto strained a calf muscle and was replaced by Tyrone Taylor. After an MRI revealed a strain, rather than something serious, the Mets waited two days before deciding Monday to put Soto on IL. In announcing the roster move, the team said, “The normal return to play for this type of injury is about 2-3 weeks.” That stretch would make this the longest IL streak of Soto’s injury-free career. This is his fourth major league IL season and first since 2021, when he missed 10 games with a sprained left shoulder. Before that, he was on the COVID IL for the first eight games of 2020 due to exposure to the virus, and in 2019, he spent at least 10 days on the IL for back spasms. Since the start of the 2022 season, he has played in 640 of the team’s 658 games, making him one of baseball’s all-time hitters.
My first thought was that the Mets would go with Brett Baty and Taylor in left field, but Baty started in right field on Saturday and was scratched with a sore thumb on Sunday, so it’s a little hard to gauge how much the team plans to use Jared Young, who started both games in left field this weekend.
I used the ZiPS projections for a few scenarios, and as you’d expect, Soto’s injury has little impact on the Mets’ playoff score because he’s not expected to miss much time. I also looked at how long absences would change the odds, but remember, nothing in this section indicates that is a remote possibility.
ZiPS Mets Projection – Juan Soto Injury
| The situation | Possible classification | Playoff Probability |
|---|---|---|
| Despite the Soto injury | 33.7% | 67.4% |
| Soto Misses Three Weeks | 32.3% | 65.9% |
| Soto Missed Two Months | 30.2% | 63.4% |
| Soto Misses Offseason | 23.8% | 54.6% |
Next we have Betts, who left Saturday’s game with back pain after hitting a home run in the first inning of the Dodgers’ 10-5 victory over the Nationals. He underwent an MRI and was diagnosed with an oblique strain. The recovery time for an oblique strain is usually about four to six weeks. Even if he needs longer than that to return to the lineup, he should have plenty of time to salvage his season after a slow start. Through his first eight games, he was hitting .179/.281/.429 with two home runs and a 101 wRC+.
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Betts stayed healthy for the 2025 campaign, except for a minor toe injury, but a stomach ailment long before the season slowed him down significantly, and may have contributed to his worst season since he would play in the New York-Penn League nearly 15 years ago. The hope was that, after a full season back in action, he would enjoy a bounce-back year. That said, he is Mookie Betts; we certainly shouldn’t expect him to not have a strong 2026 season, but it’s disappointing that his resurgence has been delayed.
The Dodgers don’t seem to have the depth they used to, but the switch option at shortstop is clear, with Miguel Rojas and Hyeseong Kim missing time to split there. While the Rojas/Kim team will be at or near the bottom of the shortstop power rankings, that’s due to more competition at the position than any lack of them. And the good news for the Dodgers is that projections generally agree that they are the strongest team in baseball. Considering they already have a three-game cushion in the NL West, they should be fine.
ZiPS Dodgers Projection – Mookie Betts Injury
| The situation | Possible classification | Playoff Probability |
|---|---|---|
| Without Bet Damage | 82.9% | 96.3% |
| Bet You Miss Six Weeks | 81.0% | 95.6% |
| Bettors Miss Three Months | 78.9% | 94.7% |
| Bettors Missed All Season | 74.6% | 92.5% |
Finally, we come to Brown. This could be the most threatening of these three injuries: Brown is a pitcher, the shoulders are a scary part of the body for pitchers, and the extent of the injury is unknown, at least to the public. While ZiPS was more favorable than other projection programs for the Astros, they realized that there was a lot of risk to them, given that most of their numbers came from a few players. One of those relatively few players is Brown, who finished third in AL Cy Young voting last year. The departure of Framber Valdez in the offseason makes Brown’s position as a cornerstone of the rotation even more important. The Astros aren’t meant to be in as strong a position as the Dodgers or Mets, so a few losses here could be disastrous.
ZiPS also isn’t particularly thrilled with Houston’s options to replace Brown. The projection for Cody Bolton, who made his first major league start last night, is a 4.94 ERA as a full-time starter, and he is day-to-day at the moment after getting hit by a bouncer in the bat of Edouard Julien. My virtual computer has high hopes for Spencer Arrighetti and Colton Gordon, both of whom are likely to replace Brown in the long term than Bolton, but sees both as only the fourth most talented of five starters, which is a big drop from a legitimate Cy Young contender.
ZiPS Astros Projection – Hunter Brown Injury
| The situation | Possible classification | Playoff Probability |
|---|---|---|
| Without Brown Damage | 31.4% | 52.8% |
| Brown Misses One Month | 29.5% | 50.6% |
| Brown Misses Three Months | 26.0% | 45.7% |
| Brown Misses Time Out | 21.1% | 37.5% |
Unless we get some really bad news about Brown, it seems the baseball gods weren’t particularly cruel on this occasion. Because if it’s another thing that the endings like, it reminds you that no matter how carefully you build your list, or how much work you do in Plan B, C, D, etc., at any time, they have the right to laugh in your face and leave you to start the journey of Triple-A in the important matchup of September.
