The 2026 season was an interesting one for James Wood. On one hand, he hit 30 home runs, posted an .891 OPS and hit the ball harder than anyone in the league. However, he hit his last homer of the season on July 26th and was bad after the All-Star break for a second straight season.
Wood had a better season than last year, but he still leaves you wanting a little bit more. I wanted to break down his season and look at the good and the bad. James Wood is an exceptional talent and still only 24 years
old. He can also be frustrating though.
First let’s start with the positives. When Wood is on his game, he is a top 5 hitter in baseball. He has shown that over long stretches in each of the past two seasons. Even with his tough finish, Wood had the 9th highest wRC+ in all of baseball and the 5th highest OPS.
Wood’s average exit velocity, barrel rate and hard hit rate all sit in the 100th percentile. When it comes to quality of contact, nobody does it better than James Wood. It is why he has back to back 30 home run seasons despite not pulling the ball like most power hitters. His opposite field power is legitimately jaw dropping.
In the first half, we saw that power on display consistently. He hit 28 homers before the All-Star break. That legendary first half was a big reason why the Nats were pushing for a Wild Card spot deep into the season. When Wood got hurt and then struggled, you could really feel that impact. The lineup is not the same when he is not rolling.
The run that Wood went on from the start of July until the All-Star break was wild. In those games, Wood went 15 for 33 with 7 homers. Talk about putting a team on your back. That is exactly what James Wood does when he is at his best.
Runs like that are why Wood had a 4.1 WAR season despite missing a month and struggling down the stretch. The talent is so apparent with him. That natural ability can make it frustrating when he isn’t clicking though. In each of the last two seasons, Wood has really struggled after the All-Star break.
After running into massive strikeout issues in the second half of 2025, I was curious to see if he could hold up in the second half of this year. From the second play resumed after the break, Wood just looked like a different player. He had a brutal road trip to start the second half, and that just set the tone.
Wood did have a monster series against the Diamondbacks, but his impact was muted. Then he went down with an oblique injury at the start of August. The Nats hoped Wood would return quickly, but his recovery took a little while.
However, after a month, Wood was back on the field. Despite being out there, it did not feel like Wood was 100% healthy. He has never been a high energy player, but he was not playing with much intensity at all when he got back. There were a few times where he did not run balls out, and even got benched by Blake Butera. I wonder how much of that was effort related and how much was Wood not trusting his body.
His swing also seemed a little bit off after he came back. Wood did not hit any home runs in September. He still hit a lot of balls hard, but his ground ball rate was 68%. Before September, Wood was elevating the ball more than ever before. That spike in ground ball rate tells me something was off mechanically with his swing and it might have something to do with his injury.
I actually wrote about Wood’s power outage. Unlike last year, Wood’s strikeout rate did not balloon to a crazy level. The reason for his .650 second half OPS this year was just a lack of power. That is weird to say about a guy who has the highest average exit velocity in the league, but it is true.
James Wood does not pull the ball in the air and sell out for power like other sluggers. That is part of what makes him special and unique. However, it also leads to him falling into some homerless runs. As he develops, I hope we see more consistency.
Even though it was not a perfect season and the second half fall off was disappointing to see, the good still outweighed the bad. James Wood remains one of the best young players in the sport. After the season, Wood said there was a lot of meat left on the bone for the team and himself. I absolutely agree with him there.
He is already a very good player, but if he can string together a full season of excellence, he will be an MVP candidate. I still have faith that the monster full season will come. James Wood is a blue chip talent, but he still needs to figure out his second half woes if he wants to reach his ceiling.
Season Grade: A-/B+
