Detroit Tigers Outfielder JaCoby Jones Scouting Report

Future Outlook

Being the deep-level fantasy baseball player that I am, I tend to follow guys that are off the beaten path in normal fantasy, so when I saw JaCoby Jones, I immediately thought of one of my favorite fantasy finds in my tenure playing dynasty fantasy baseball, and that’s Bill Hall. Hall was a guy that the Milwaukee Brewers drafted out of high school and, like Jones, he was very raw. He took his time getting to the majors, and he also played some shortstop, some third base, and some center field in his pro career.

Hall had the exceptional athleticism that Jones also has. While some could consider Hall a cautionary tale for Jones, Hall did have an 11-year career, and while he had only one real “monster” season, in 2006, when he hit .270/.345/.553 with 35 home runs and 8 stolen bases, he was a guy who had a career 162-game average of 19 home runs and 10 stolen bases, so he was productive throughout his career. His undoing was his poor plate discipline as Hall struck out at a 26.4% rate and walked only 7.8% of the time. That sort of rate is not terribly out of line with what Jones has done in his career, but if he ends up playing in over 1,000 games, hitting over 100 career home runs, and collecting over 800 career hits as Hall did, I’d say Jones was a successful prospect.

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The Tigers will see what they have with Jones this month, and he’s already been announced as a representative of the Tigers in the Arizona Fall League, his second appearances there. He’s been announced as an outfielder for the AFL this go round, so the Tigers certainly want him to spend some time learning the outfield in more depth to likely spend 2017 in the outfield for the major league club. His showing so far with the major league club has offered plenty of excitement for the Tigers, and they’d likely want to keep his energy around.