2026 MLB Home Run Derby Rules, Odds, Betting Predictions

MLB All-Star Week gives us a few days to relax after the long grind of the first half of the baseball season. While the actual All-Star Game isn’t until Tuesday evening, tonight features one of the most exciting parts of the festivities: the MLB Home Run Derby. We’ve got a stacked eight-player field ready to crush some baseballs throughout Citizens Bank Ballpark in Philadelphia.

Before tonight’s Home Run Derby begins at 8 PM ET, let’s go over the betting angles, review the sluggers and then make a prediction for the Home Run Derby.

2026 MLB Home Run Derby Odds and Betting Trends

Here’s what the MLB odds board has for the Home Run Derby:

• Kyle Schwarber, PHI, +330
• Junior Caminero, TB, +425
• Munetaka Murakami, CWS, +500
• Jac Caglianone, KC, +650
• Jordan Walker, STL, +700
• Bryce Harper, PHI, +850
• Ben Rice, NYY, +850
• Willson Contreras, BOS, +1200

This field sets up pretty much as you’d expect: Kyle Schwarber, the MLB home run leader and player who is in his home ballpark, is at the top with the shortest odds. Even though Bryce Harper is older, he has won a Home Run Derby before (2018), so you can’t ignore the value there. Ultimately, it’s anybody’s HR Derby to win, so any of these players could win and are priced appropriately. Contreras has the longest odds, but could be a nice longshot wager.

2026 Home Run Derby Preview

Tonight’s MLB Home Run Derby features some new rules for this year’s iteration. In years past, each participant would have either 40 pitches or a time limit of three minutes to hit as many home runs as they could during the first round.

From MLB.com: “Eight players will still make up the field, same as in years past. But instead of trying to hit as many homers as they can during timed rounds, participants will start each round with a finite number of swings: 20 in Round 1, 15 in Round 2 and 15 again in the final round. All swings will count against a player’s swing allotment, whether it results in a homer or not. However, a player who homers on his final swing of a round can keep swinging until he doesn’t hit one out.”

The 2026 MLB Home Derby favors prodigious power over endurance, so it really opens up the field tonight. Any hitter can get hot and get a run going to propel them into the next round of swings. 

2026 Home Run Derby Participants

Last year’s Home Run Derby saw Seattle’s Cal Raleigh win with an 18-15 score in the finals over one of the betting favorites this go-around, Junior Caminero of the Tampa Bay Rays. Caminero has been on a blistering home run binge, with 13 home runs in 17 games as of the time of this writing. He’ll easily be one of the favorites. Of course, the betting favorite is Philadelphia’s own Kyle Schwarber, who leads baseball with 31 home runs and the benefit of his home ballpark. Schwarber has been in two previous Home Run Derby contests, in 2022 and in 2018, where he lost in the Finals to now-teammate Bryce Harper. Speaking of Harper, he makes his third appearance, his first since 2018 when he won.

Besides Caminero returning from last season, we’ve got five new participants entering the field. Perhaps none more intriguing than rookie Munetaka Murakami from the Chicago White Sox. Murakami entered Major League Baseball after eight seasons in Japan, where he hit over 30 home runs in five of those seasons and started his MLB career with 20 home runs before the month of June. Yankees slugger Ben Rice has 29 home runs and has five home runs in his last six games entering play on Sunday. St. Louis’s Jordan Walker (24 HR) , Boston’s Willson Contreras (20 HR) and Kansas City’s Jac Caglianone (15 HR) round out the field.

MLB Prediction: Who Will Win the 2026 MLB Home Run Derby?

The easy money is looking to the current home run leader in his own ballpark, Kyle Schwarber. He has the shortest odds of any player in the field. It’s also easy to look to the hottest hitter, Junior Caminero, who made the Finals last season. But looking at a previous winner in his home ballpark is too enticing, especially with the third-longest odds at the time of this writing. Anything can happen in a Home Run Derby, so we’ll take the most attractive of the longer-odds players in the field, which is Bryce Harper.

Best Bet: Bryce Harper to win the 2026 Home Run Derby (+850)