Chicago Cubs pitcher Justin Steele did not hold back in his criticism after finding out about the nation’s latest travesty. The absurdity swept across the country last week and on Monday Steele finally broke his silence.
It’s despicable, an injustice that Nico Hoerner, who is coming off the best year of his career, was somehow not included in MLB Network’s top-100 players list heading into the 2026 season. Sure, I’m a Cubs fan and there’s bias here, but how the hell is a guy who finished last year as the 20th most valuable player according to FanGraphs and tied with Juan Soto on Baseball Reference as the seventh most valuable player in MLB not considered a top-100 player right now?
Hoerner won a gold glove at second base in 2025, his second in three years, while also finishing second in the National League for the batting title. No, Hoerner isn’t an all-world hitter and you won’t confuse him with a middle-of-the-order slugger, but he obviously creates surplus value on defense and on the bases.
Oh and it’s not like Hoerner is a one-year wonder either. Since moving over to second base permanently in 2023, Hoerner ranks second among all MLB second basemen with a 13.2 fWAR, trailing only Ketel Marte. Dating back to 2022, Hoerner ranks 18th in fWAR out of all qualified players in MLB. That’s a list of 306 players.
Steele was in lockstep with the rest of Cubs fans, reacting strongly to the ridiculous top-100 list that omitted Hoerner.
Here’s the list that MLB Network released. The Cubs did have four players ranked in the top-100.
Alex Bregman: No. 35
Pete Crow-Armstrong: No. 40
Michael Busch: No. 67
Seiya Suzuki: No. 77
As you can see, the list doesn’t only include position players, so it could be difficult debating how much one position player compares to a starting pitcher or a reliever, but it is infuriating to see Brice Turang ranked 62nd and Jose Altuve ranked 81st when they’re not even considered better second basemen than Hoerner?
See, MLB Network is ranking each position and releasing a top-10 list and guess where Hoerner ranks? Ahead of Turang and Altuve, third overall.
Like Steele said, that original MLB Network list is a complete joke.
