It’s a difficult task to follow a season like the one Kyle Schwarber had in 2025. He finished first in the National League and second across all of baseball with 56 homers, led all of baseball with 132 RBIs, tied his career best with a .928 OPS, played in all 162 games, and finished second in MVP voting. It was a tall order, but Schwarber looked well on his way to not only equaling that season but possibly passing it in the first half of 2026.
However, Schwarber was decidedly not himself in the second
half, as his production dropped mightily after suffering a mysterious back ailment in late June that caused him to change his swing.His full season numbers still averaged out for him to finish the year in a tie for the MLB lead in home runs with 45, but Schwarber’s second half slump will lead to concerns slipping into 2027 as he gets another year older.
2026 regular season stats: 156 games played, .232/.354/.503, .853 OPS, 45 HR, 97 RBI, 130 wRC+, 2.9 fWAR
What went right
Schwarber picked up right where he left off from 2025 in the early parts of 2026. He slugged 22 home runs through the season’s first 56 games at the end of May, just ahead of his pace from last year when he had 19 homers through 58 games by Memorial Day. By the end of the year, he had been personally responsible for 45 of the Phillies’ 182 total homers, placing the teams with the 17th most after ranking ninth with 212 last season. Outside of Bryce Harper, Schwarber was the Phillies only real source of consistent power, as no other Phillies player besides those two had more than 19 HRs in 2026.
With the All-Star game being held in Philadelphia for the first time at Citizens Bank Park, it was widely expected that Schwarber would take advantage of that prodigious power and take part in the Home Run Derby, especially after his performance in the swing off to end the 2025 All-Star game that earned him MVP honors. And take part he did, and Schwarber put on a show in front of a raucous home crowd before ultimately falling short as the runner up to Jordan Walker of the Cardinals.
Schwarber also finally broke the team’s three-year streak without a walk-off home run, as his mammoth blast on August 23rd that hit the batter’s eye in center field capped off a historic six-run comeback that preserved the Phillies then nine-game winning streak. In a season filled with frustration that ended with a whimper, that two-out rally was easily one of the highlights of the year for the Phillies.
What went wrong
It flew under the radar a bit as the Phillies offense as a whole struggled in the second half, but Schwarber fell off dramatically after the All-Star break. After slashing .254/.367/.560 in the first half, Schwarber slumped to a .199/.336/.416 batting line in the second half. The team routinely downplayed the impact of the mysterious back injury, but its existence coupled with his second half performance casts doubt on just how healthy Schwarber was as the season went on.
Schwarber also struck out at his highest career rate since 2017, as he punched out in 31.4% of his plate appearances in 2026, way up from the 27.2% mark from 2025. He chased at a higher rate than normal, offering at 26.1% of pitches he saw out of the strike zone, a notable increase from his 21.5% chase rate in 2025 and his highest since the shortened 2020 season. That combination led to Schwarber racking up 220 strikeouts, just seven shy of Colson Montgomery of the White Sox who set the new MLB single season record for strikeouts in a season, dethroning Mark Reynolds’ 223 Ks from 2009. Schwarber has always been one to rack up the strikeouts, but this much of a jump as he enters his mid-30s should be cause for some alarm.
Final Grade: B+
Schwarber was one of the only two above average hitters in the Phillies regular starting lineup and was a legitimate All-Star in the first half, but his crash in the second half keeps this grade from being any higher.
Fair or not, Schwarber and his counterpart Harper are judged to a higher standard than the rest of the offense as they are the two biggest threats in a lineup that severely lacks them. If they don’t perform, the offense suffers. Therefore, it’s no coincidence that the Phillies struggled in September as Schwarber bottomed out with a .172 AVG and .710 OPS in the month. The Phillies will need Schwarber to age well, as he is only entering the second year of his new five year, $150M contract. The absolute last thing the team needs is another anchor of a contract weighing them down.
