Let's just get it out of the way: the Los Angeles Dodgers are, once again, the most dangerous team in baseball. Back-to-back World Series champions. The richest roster in the sport. And at the center of it all, the most extraordinary player anyone has ever seen wear a uniform.

The question for 2026 isn't whether the Dodgers are good. It's whether they can do something only a handful of teams in baseball history have done: win three in a row.

Shohei Ohtani: Still Breaking Baseball

There is no adequate way to write about Shohei Ohtani without sounding like you're making things up. In 2025 alone, the man won NL MVP, led all of baseball in runs scored and total bases, led the NL in slugging percentage and OPS, won the NLCS MVP by hitting three home runs AND pitching six scoreless innings with ten strikeouts in the same game, and then terrorized the Toronto Blue Jays in the World Series so thoroughly that they resorted to intentionally walking him to keep him off the bases. He reached base nine times in a single postseason game — tying the record.

He is now 31 years old. He has a second child on the way. He is, if anything, getting better.

This season, the Dodgers have added outfielder Kyle Tucker and closer Edwin Díaz to an already loaded roster. Projection systems have them pegged at over 100 wins. Starting pitching injuries — to Tyler Glasnow, Blake Snell, Gavin Stone, and Landon Knack — have slowed them in the early going, but even a depleted Dodgers rotation is better than most full ones. As of this writing they are at 32-20, in first place in the NL West, with Ohtani doing Ohtani things.

The last team to win three straight World Series was the 2000 New York Yankees. The Dodgers have the talent, the depth, the front office, and the financial muscle to make a real run at it. What they need is health — and a little bit of October luck.

The Padres: Still Dangerous, But the Window Is Narrowing

Give San Diego credit: they keep punching. The Padres have made the playoffs in four of the last five seasons under a franchise that previously only made it five times in 52 years. Fernando Tatis Jr. and Manny Machado remain two of the best players in the National League. Jackson Merrill is a star. The bullpen is deep.

But the Padres are starting to show their age and their limits. They lost Dylan Cease in the offseason. Walker Buehler has been inconsistent. Blake Snell — now on their roster — has spent more time on the injured list than on the mound. Under first-year manager Craig Stammen, they're scrapping and fighting, sitting near .500 early in the season, holding on to a wild card spot mostly on talent and grit rather than depth.

The uncomfortable truth is that the Padres are a team without a World Series title in their entire franchise history, and the margin for error to get there is shrinking every year. Tatis and Machado aren't getting younger. The prospect pipeline isn't overflowing. This could still be a very good San Diego season. But the ceiling feels lower than it did a few years ago.

The Giants: Four Years of Hovering Around .500 and Counting

Here is a stat that should embarrass the San Francisco front office: the Giants have finished between 79 and 81 wins in four consecutive seasons. Not bad enough to get a top draft pick. Not good enough to compete. Just... there. Logan Webb is still one of the best starting pitchers in baseball, leading the majors in innings last year with 207. But the Giants lost Hayden Birdsong to Tommy John surgery for the entire 2026 season, and their offense has been average at best.

New manager Bob Apodaca comes to San Francisco straight from the University of Tennessee, which is an unusual hire for a major league club. Top prospect Bryce Eldridge — a massive first baseman with genuine power — is in the minor leagues getting reps. The Giants need him to be ready, and soon, because right now this team does not have a clear path to anything beyond another .500 season.

The NL West is, as it has been for years, the Dodgers and everyone else. The Padres will fight for a wild card. The Giants will try to avoid embarrassment. And Shohei Ohtani will continue to do things that make you stop what you're doing and just stare at the screen.

Three-peat? It's possible. Don't bet against them.