Is Spencer Jones the Yankees’ Best Trade Chip or a Future Star?
Down on the farm, Yankees prospect has been laying waste to minor league pitching. Is he a future star for them, or their best trade chip?
Down on the farm, the New York Yankees have a 6-foot-7 California-born outfielder slapping home runs left, front, and center this season. Between the top two levels of their organization, they actually have two. The Yankees have an incredibly promising hitter developing in their farm system in Spencer Jones that fits nearly the exact same profile as Aaron Judge minus the big league success under his belt.
Their 2022 first-round selection has shown insane pure power talent and has an insane 70-grade raw power asset according to FanGraphs. Considering his dominance at the Triple-A level, Jones could very well prove to be Judge disciple and follow in his footsteps. He’s got the third-best wRC+ in all of MiLB this season and he seems to just keep getting better and better.
However, the Yankees’ outfield is currently filled by strong (and in some cases exceptional) MLB-calibre talent which could prove difficult in Jones’ quest to hold a consistent Major League role in the organization. His trade value is immensely high, as he’s Just Baseball’s 6th-ranked Yankees prospect this season, and the team could benefit from moving on from him to bring in yet another star player.
Mr. Jones Knows How to Hit
Jones’ performance has been one of the most popular stories in MiLB this season, as his ascent through the lower levels of the Yankees’ system has taken the league by storm. Starting the 2025 season with the Double-A Somerset Patriots, he slugged his way up to the Triple-A Wilkes-Barre/Scranton RailRiders and might be heading up from there soon, too.
So far with the RailRiders, he’s appeared in 19 games with an incredible 13 home runs already to go along with an almost inhuman slashline: .400/.457/.950 for an OPS of 1.407. He only trails his total bases total from his 49 Double-A games earlier this season by 28…in 30 fewer games.
Against a higher calibre of opposing pitching, he has only tallied 3 less home runs, 7 less RBIs, 3 less doubles, and 4 less stolen bases through these 19 games than in his entire 49-game stint with Somerset. Jones is also one of only 14 players this season in the International League with at least 6 stolen bases without being caught stealing even once.
10 home runs in his last 12 games; 8 home runs in his last 8 games; 5 home runs in his last 4 games; 5 three-hit games in Triple-A; the league’s best OPS among players with 19+ games played. Jones has been absolutely tearing the cover off the baseball, and it’s still uncertain how the Yankees will capitalize on this success he’s had.
Potential Trade Asset?
The Yankees simply don’t have a starting job available for Jones in the near future. Judge is under contract until 2039 earning $40 million per season, Cody Bellinger has a player option for next season to return to the Yankees, and former top Yankees prospect Jasson Domínguez still has several seasons before free agency becomes an option for him. On top of this, Trent Grisham has been a surprisingly strong hitter in center field for them this year, too.
Put simply, the Yankees could very viably view Spencer Jones in terms of the value he could bring to the team this season in their quest to return to the World Series. While Jones’ potential in the MLB is plain to see and he could be a very solid outfielder in the world’s top league, the New York Yankees might decide they have enough confidence with their current outfield core to move on from Jones.
The Yankees need some better production from the hot corner at third base and could use an improvement to their pitching staff, both in the rotation and bullpen. There are plenty of trade targets for the Yankees to go after, and a package (or simply one-for-one deal) including Jones could make any of these deals go through easily.
2025’s class of trade deadline targets is one of the deepest the league has seen in recent seasons and if there’s any team known for going after this type of player it’s the New York Yankees. The team’s legacy across recent decades of acquiring superstar players for prospects is very deep, and Jones could be the latest Yankee prospects to be moved on from in favor of big-league ready superstar talent.
Future Bronx Bomber?
Of course, it would be ridiculous to simply assume that any player could replicate the generational success that Judge has put on display since his MLB debut, but perhaps the Yankees might deem Jones too important to move on from. Predicting is never going to be an exact science, but what Jones has shown in the minor leagues this season could definitely be enough to keep him in the Yankees’ system.
Although the Yankees could benefit from swapping Jones for a current star like MLB’s leading RBI-getter in Eugenio Suárez or closers Emmanuel Clase and Jhoan Durán, his prowess and pure destruction of baseball across all levels of MiLB could translate well to the MLB level.
According to Ricky Ricardo, the voice of Yankees’ Spanish Radio broadcasts, “There’s a proposal on the table…5 Yankees prospects, not Lombard, not Jones. 5 prospects including Schlittler to the Diamondbacks for Merrill Kelly, Eugenio Suárez, and Jalen Beeks.”
Current American League Rookie of the Year candidate Nick Kurtz of the Athletics only played 20 games in Triple-A this season before getting the call to the Majors, and hit 7 home runs with 7 doubles, 24 RBI, and a slashline of .321/.385/.655. Jones has surpassed nearly all of these accomplishments already this year at Triple-A, and Kurtz’s success since his MLB callup could entice the Yankees to follow a similar process with Jones.
There is a very solid possibility that Jones could be called up to the MLB later this season and make waves across the league with his performance. If he is going to be traded to another team by the Yankees, it’s going to have to happen before he makes his MLB debut. As of right now, the Yankees have to decide whether Jones will be more valuable as a trade chip or future slugging superstar.
Based on his performance thus far in 2025, it seems pretty clear that Jones has a bright future in the MLB – it’s just a matter of whether it’ll be in pinstripes or not. The ‘Evil Empire,’ as they’re commonly referred to, has one of the league’s most gifted young hitters at their disposal right now and it’s honestly anyone’s guess what happens to him.
If the Yankees can improve their roster now without trading Spencer Jones, they will come out of the trade deadline much stronger than they otherwise would have. His trade value is higher than it might ever be, so dealing him away to get a strong bat or arm to bolster their World Series hopes is certainly not out of the question.
Written by
Ethan has been writing for Just Baseball since 2024 and is fascinated by how sabermetric statistics can assist our understanding of outcomes and probability in baseball.…