Predicting how many games the Chicago White Sox will win in 2026 is challenging because of the odd mix of veterans and inexperienced players and the current state of their rebuild. Plus, there’s always the inherent bias of underestimating a team that is under Chris Getz’s management. Fortunately, statistics provides an unbiased and clear way to determine floor and ceiling expected wins.
I created a model to predict expected wins from team WAR using data from the last three seasons. I picked WAR because it’s a strong metric that measures team and player performance compared to bench and minor league talent. It’s also widely used by MLB front offices to inform trades and signings. While WAR has its flaws due to its variability across baseball databases and its reliance on replacement players (which can be subjective), WAR is a proven measure of team aptitude. I narrowed my analysis to 2023-25 data to avoid pre-universal DH-era WAR calculations for pitchers. Three years of data provide a large enough sample size to understand recent team WAR trends.
To determine the expected number of Sox wins, I created a linear regression to analyze the relationship between team WAR using data from all 30 teams from 2023-25. The following chart and formula summarizes the predictive relationship between team WAR and wins.
Expected wins = 49.50848 + 0.94504 * WAR
Using this formula and FanGraphs’ 27.5 White Sox team WAR prediction as of February 20, the Sox are expected to win 74 games, rounded to the nearest game. I used the model’s residual error of 4.877 to determine a floor of 64 and ceiling of 84 expected wins, adhering to the model’s 95% confidence interval.
These floors are quite conservative on the floor side and generous on the ceiling side. New team dynamics and potential sophomore slumps could prevent the Sox from making another 19-game improvement, but a four-win improvement seems laughably low. On the other hand, setting the ceiling at better than .500 baseball and a wild card run is too ambitious. Everything would have to go perfectly to plan, and the Sox would need to be buyers at the trade deadline.
Realistically, the Sox should win at least 70 games, with their ceiling being 81 wins. Narrowing it down to a single number, 74 games is a fair expectation and should be considered a strong sign of rebuilding progress.