While MLB is ready for a month of postseason baseball to determine who will eventually hoist the World Series trophy, let’s begin reflecting on the 2026 regular season that just finished. There’s no better way to start than by dissecting the league’s 40 home run club, right?
I knew that’s what you were thinking, and that’s why I’m here. Eight sluggers joined the 40-homer club this year. That’s the most since 2019, but for the first time since 2021, nobody reached 50. Here are some observations on MLB’s most powerful single-season club.
Related: A Complete Guide to Single-Season (& Single-Game) HR Performances
Observations on MLB’s 40 Home Run Club for the 2026 Season
8 Members, Including 4 First-Timers
The 40-homer club was eight players deep in 2026, and it included the following dudes:
- Pete Crow-Armstrong, Chicago Cubs: 45 homers
- Kyle Schwarber, Philadelphia Phillies: 45
- Pete Alonso, Baltimore Orioles: 43
- Yordan Alvarez, Houston Astros: 42
- Junior Caminero, Tampa Bay Rays: 42
- Matt Olson, Atlanta Braves: 41
- Ben Rice, New York Yankees: 41
- Hunter Goodman, Colorado Rockies: 41
Among this group, half have been here before, and the other half have broken new ground. The first-timers are Crow-Armstrong, Alvarez, Rice, and Goodman.
For the returners, there are varying levels of experience. Schwarber and Alonso have both reached this number four different times during their career. Caminero has accomplished the feat in back-to-back campaigns. Olson is also here for the second time, but it’s the first time since he slugged a Braves franchise record 54 taters in 2023.
If we’re looking at the all-time 40 home run club, we’ve now seen 382 such performances in MLB history.
This Is The Lowest Full-Season League Leader Total in Over a Decade…
As we can see above, PCA and Schwarber finished the season atop MLB’s home run leaderboard. Although it’s the first tie we’ve seen since 2021 (Salvador Perez and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. with 48 each), it’s the lowest MLB leader total since 2014 (I’m not counting 2020’s 60-game season in this, of course).
That’s when Nelson Cruz led the American League with 40 homers for the Baltimore Orioles, and Giancarlo Stanton slugged 37 to take home the National League crown for the Miami Marlins.
…But The Most 40 Home Run Seasons Since 2019
The 2019 MLB season included a ton of home runs, along with talk of juiced baseballs. This particular campaign included 10 players reaching the 40-homer plateau:
- Pete Alonso: 53 homers
- Eugenio Suárez: 49
- Jorge Soler: 48
- Cody Bellinger: 47
- Mike Trout: 45
- Christian Yelich: 44
- Nelson Cruz: 41
- Nolan Arenado: 41
- Alex Bregman: 41
- Ronald Acuña Jr.: 41
Of course, the one big difference here is that the 2019 group had one player slug at least 50 homers, while that didn’t happen in 2026.
How The 2026 Club Stacks Up Against Recent Years
We’ve already established that MLB’s 40-homer club in 2026 is the biggest it’s been this decade, but by how much? Here’s a quick breakdown of what the club has looked like each season since 2021:
- 2021: five players (no 50-homer seasons)
- 2022: three players (one 50-homer season)
- 2023: six players (one 50-homer season)
- 2024: four players (two 50-homer seasons)
- 2025: seven players (four 50-homer seasons)
- 2026: eight players (no 50-homer seasons)
Nothing quite like going from a quartet of 50-homer campaigns in one year to none the next, right? As a refresher, the 2025 season included Cal Raleigh (60), Schwarber (56), Shohei Ohtani (55), and Aaron Judge (53) passing the half-century mark. Suárez (49) nearly joined them, too.
(At Least) One Fun Fact For Each 40 Home Run Club Member
Pete Crow-Armstrong
I mean, you can take your pick when it comes to finding a fun stat to put PCA’s historic season into perspective.
But if I had to choose one? It’s probably that he’s the first MLB center fielder (and 10th player overall) to compile at least 40 homers, 30 doubles, and 30 steals in one season.
Kyle Schwarber
As mentioned above, this is Schwarber’s fourth 40-homer performance, and they’ve all come within the past five seasons. He did it in 2022 and 2023, along with 2025 and 2026 for the Phillies.
He’s only been in Philly since the start of the 2022 season, but he owns four of the top 11 most powerful seasons in franchise history. Between 2015 and 2021, his career high was 38 homers, which he hit in 2019 for the Chicago Cubs. But since 2022, he hasn’t hit fewer than 38 taters in a season (that happened in 2024).
Pete Alonso
The Polar Bear’s first season in Baltimore was a success, even if the Orioles missed the playoffs for a second straight season. His 43 homers and 113 RBI both led the American League.
Alonso is not only the first MLB player to hit 40-plus homers during his first year in each league, but he’s also the first to claim a single-season RBI crown in both the AL and NL, in separate years.
Yordan Alvarez
While Alvarez slugged 40-plus homers for the first time in his career, he’s no stranger to powerful seasons. He’s only 29 years old, but has already logged five seasons of at least 30 dingers.
It really just depends on his health. He appeared in at least 114 games for the Astros in each of those occurrences. Alvarez barely missed out on the AL lead with his 42 homers, but that number is a new single-season Houston record for primary designated hitters.
Junior Caminero
Before Junior Caminero made landfall in the big leagues, the Rays had just one occurrence of a 40-homer season in franchise history. That was accomplished by Carlos Peña when he slugged 46 homers in 2007.
But after back-to-back such performances from Caminero in 2025 and 2026, he’s doubled Peña’s count on his own and tripled the franchise total. And he’s only 23 years old! The slugging third baseman has hit a combined 87 homers since the start of 2025, which ties Eddie Mathews’ record for the most by a player in their age-21 and 22 seasons.
Matt Olson
After Olson put up a 54-spot in 2023, he failed to reach the 30-homer mark in each of the following two seasons. He came pretty close, though, as he hit 29 taters in each of 2024 and 2025.
But the first baseman got himself back over the hump in 2026 with 41 homers. Unsurprisingly, he did most of his damage in Atlanta wins. When the Braves were victorious, Olson hit 32 homers and posted a .953 OPS. When they lost, those numbers dropped to nine and .632, respectively.
Ben Rice
There have been nine instances of a Yankees first baseman hitting at least 40 homers in a season. It’s been done by four dudes: Lou Gehrig (five times), Tino Martinez, Jason Giambi (twice)…and now Ben Rice.
Between 2024 and 2025, Rice slugged 33 homers across 708 plate appearances. But in 2026, he hit eight more homers in 41 fewer plate appearances.
Hunter Goodman
Goodman’s homer progression was a steady climb for the Rockies. Here’s a look at his production over the past four years:
- 2023: 1 homer in 23 games
- 2024: 13 homers in 70 games
- 2025: 31 homers in 144 games
- 2026: 41 homers in 138 games
He broke the franchise’s single-season catcher home run record in 2025…just to come back and break it once more in 2026. Goodman’s campaign also included seven multi-homer games. He slugged a trifecta of taters in one game on two different occasions, and they happened less than a month apart (June 27 and July 19).
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