The Spencer Jones conundrum

Photo by Matt Kipp/Minor League Baseball

Spencer Jones was forgotten entering 2025. Even in a weakened farm system, Jones’ inability to capitalize on his easy power consistently saw him plummet down prospect boards, going from a top-100 guy in baseball to maybe No. 5 in an organization with a consensus bottom ten farm. He posted a modest 127 wRC+ with Double-A Somerset in 2024, but saw his stolen base numbers regress from 43 to 25 while his strikeout rate skyrocketed to an untenable 36.8 percent. With one year remaining until Rule 5 eligibility

and entering his age-24 season, it became make-or-break.

The season isn’t over yet, but it sure as hell looks like Jones figured something out. After a multi-homer game on Sunday, Jones enters tonight’s game with 26 home runs in 65 games after having just 17 in 122 games last year. He’s been the best hitter in minor league baseball, slashing .317/.415/.691 with both Somerset and Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. His 26 bombs are tied for the minor league lead with 27-year-old Ryan Ward, while his 205 wRC+ is heads and shoulders above every other qualified hitter in MiLB.

Yankees top prospect Spencer Jones is RAKING since being called up to Triple-A:

16 G, .426 AVG, 10 HR, 1.422 OPS pic.twitter.com/dHueus2NwG

— MLB (@MLB) July 21, 2025

So, what changed? Jones has modestly reduced his strikeout rate, but the big change is his batted ball data. He had a 46.9 ground ball rate in 2023 and cut it to 42.3 percent in 2024. In 2025? It’s down to 29.9 percent. He’s obliterating the ball and putting loft under it, which has skyrocketed his ISO from .193 in 2024 to .375. His quality of contact is beautiful and, unlike most hitters who vastly benefit from pulling the ball, his power is so easy that he can blast the ball anywhere, similar to a James Wood. How much damage does he do when he puts the ball in play? If you remove his strikeouts, Jones is hitting a mind-boggling .506 with a 1.105 SLG%.

ProspectSavant

Now, the issues are still there. Jones is still posting a dreadful zone contact rate, a 37.6 whiff rate, and despite his improvements in that regard, is still striking out 31.7 percent of the time this year. It’s still a major red flag not being able to consistently make contact, especially when the gap between Triple-A and the majors continues to skyrocket.

That is what makes Spencer Jones an enigma. He’s the most perplexing prospect in recent memory. Think of recent Yankees prospects: Jasson Domínguez didn’t have this risk, and as much as Anthony Volpe has disappointed in the majors, he was considered to have a decent floor. The floor for Jones has always been catastrophically low, a Bobby Dalbec, Yankees Joey Gallo level of low that dooms him to a journeyman Quad-A type. The kind of player that gets lambasted out of a large market. A prospect having a low floor isn’t unheard of, but it’s another thing when that prospect simultaneously has a gigantic ceiling.

If Jones were to put it together, he has some of the easiest pop in professional baseball. He plays a good center field by all accounts and has blazing speed for someone of his size. Evaluators have always dreamed of the “lefty Aaron Judge”, but Jones has better physical traits than Judge ever had. He’ll never be close to the caliber of hitter as Judge, who’s making an argument for the greatest right-handed hitter to ever play the game, but he has a ceiling of a perennial 30/30 center fielder who’s a regular in the All-Star Game for a decade. If Jones becomes prime Joey Gallo, that would be an incredible outcome. Despite his failures in New York, he was a bonafide stud as an All-Star hitter and Gold Glove outfielder.

That ceiling seemed unattainable very recently. In my eyes, he’s gone from a guy who could realistically be a fourth outfielder thanks to his traits to someone who could start in the majors for years to come. An attainable outcome for Jones might be like a more athletic Matt Wallner of the Minnesota Twins, who has a career 133 wRC+ in 227 games despite a dreadful 33.4 K%. Wallner has struggled with consistency in 2025 despite lower strikeouts, but is a good hitter, make no mistake.

Spencer Jones is going to be a monster. He learned how to lift the ball. He's now a more athletic version of Matt Wallner. Yankees player dev with a massive W here. pic.twitter.com/9FIGLlwwAH

— Eli Ben-Porat (@EliBenPorat) July 11, 2025

If the Yankees weren’t contending, they would absolutely open room to allow Jones to see if he can get closer to that ceiling. What do you have to lose? Unfortunately for Jones, he’s coming up on a team with not only winning aspirations and a tightening contention window, but an outfield logjam.

There’s really nowhere for him to play, as Judge and Domínguez figure to be outfield fixtures for years to come, while the team figures to either retain Cody Bellinger in free agency or pursue an upgrade in Kyle Tucker. With Giancarlo Stanton entrenched at DH, that spells a major logjam for Jones, even if he puts it together.

But that might not even be the most complicated part of all this. The Yankees only figure to have one truly untouchable piece in George Lombard Jr. While the team probably doesn’t want to part ways with the likes of Cam Schlittler, Elmer Rodriguez-Cruz, and Bryce Cunningham, they probably would for the right deal. Where does Jones fall in this? He went from a guy with glaring red flags that made him a nonexistent trade piece to someone who could potentially be the centerpiece in a deadline trade.

The mystery is how other teams value him. The industry remains perplexed, as it should be, about his profile. Baseball America recently moved him back to No. 3 in the Yankees’ system behind Lombard Jr. and Schlittler. He appears to be back on the periphery of Top 100 lists. The Yankees are serious suitors for the grand prize of the deadline, Arizona’s Eugenio Suarez, but they seem to lean towards asking for young pitching instead of someone like Jones.

Spencer Jones is the Yankees' No. 3 prospect after our latest Top 30 update.

The outfielder hit two homers on Sunday, giving him 10 total over 16 Triple-A games.

( ️:@swbrailriders)pic.twitter.com/hUgvGy3tmM

— Baseball America (@BaseballAmerica) July 21, 2025

Due to the lack of high-end talent available this July, it appears that Jones will finish the year in the organization, barring an unforeseen player becoming available or, say, Arizona valuing him more than a young pitcher. Will he make his major league debut this September? That seems up in the air.

Either way, a final decision on the fate of the most controversial prospect in baseball will come sooner rather than later. Do the Yankees see him as a future star, or do they remain skeptical that a player with tremendous holes in his swing can be a good big leaguer?

Spencer Jones has been on a tear since his promotion to Triple-A. Aaron Boone shares some thoughts on what he's seen from the prospect. #YANKSonYES pic.twitter.com/d2N7UU9VlM

— YES Network (@YESNetwork) July 21, 2025

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