He’s Here! Detroit promotes Jackson Jobe, the league’s best pitching prospect

As if this month couldn’t have been more exciting for Tigers fans!

And you thought the 2024 Detroit Tigers ’ wild card run has been fun so far.

The team announced on Monday afternoon that they are promoting Jackson Jobe, the No. 6 overall prospect and best pitching prospect according to MLB Pipeline. FanGraphs is slightly more bullish on the right-hander, listing him at “only” No. 15 overall and No. 2 among pitchers.

Jobe started the season in Double-A Erie, where he threw 73 ²⁄₃ innings with the SeaWolves with 81 strikeouts to 38 walks (9.9 and 4.64 per nine, respectively). He allowed just two home runs in that span and drew cries from fans to promote the star prospect, especially when the Tigers’ pitching rotation more represented a patchwork quilt than a real MLB rotation in July and August.

But Detroit President of Baseball Operations Scott Harris reminded fans over and over that Jobe was not going to throw a pitch in Detroit before seeing Triple-A Toledo.

He didn’t lie.

Jobe was promoted to the Mud Hens on Sept. 7 and made two starts there, earning a 6.00 ERA with seven punchouts to five walks in nine innings, though the numbers are skewed more by a not-so-good start against Kansas City’s Triple-A Storm Chasers. His second start vs. Cleveland’s Triple-A team, the Columbus Clippers, was much better: five innings, four strikeouts and two earned runs.

Jobe’s stay as a Toledoean lasted just over two weeks.

He will join fellow former ‘Hens starters Brant Hurter and Ty Madden in the bullpen beginning on Tuesday, Sept. 24 for the Tigers’ critical three-game series against the Tampa Bay Rays .

As of now, it’s unclear what Jobe’s 2024 role will be other than that it won’t be as a starter. Manager AJ Hinch will have the freedom to use the youngster in a variety of ways, meaning we could see Jobe as early as Tuesday follow up after future-Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal, or he could relieve Reese Olson, whose innings have been limited since his return from a right shoulder injury, on Thursday.

Perhaps we’ll even see him make his debut with a one inning appearance in which he’ll be allowed to let loose and throw as hard as he wants.

Jobe has at least two elite pitches right now — his fastball climbed the ladder to 102 miles per hour in spring training — and his slider, which, while not a finished product, consistently rolls over an elite-elite 3,000 RPM. The shape and location is less consistent at this point.

But anticipating just a fastball or slider is a fool’s errand — Jobe also features a two-seam fastball and a cutter to go with a curveball and changeup. All of them are considered above-average if not better, with the split-changeup he developed in 2023 routinely a plus offering throughout most of this summer for him.

While initial reactions to Jobe’s promotion seemed to indicate that he would not be eligible for a potential playoff series, but further digging revealed that the Tigers can use an exemption from the MLB to use Jobe as a replacement for pitcher Sawyer Gipson-Long, who was on the original 40-man roster but has missed the entire season recovering from Tommy John surgery.

Mind you, that an exemption needs to be approved by the league before Jobe’s eligibility for postseason play is solidified.

RHP Shelby Miller (4.53 ERA and 4.48 FIP in 51 appearances) was designated for assignment to clear room for Jobe, who was not on the 40-man roster. Miller had a team option for the 2025 season, which is now void.

Jobe joins a Detroit roster that has made its recent miraculous playoff run — going from double-digit games out of the race to now holding a Wild Card spot on Sept. 23 — that has done almost all of its damage with youth. But at 22-years-old, the Oklahoma native will slot in as the most juvenile player on the team and the youngest on the pitching staff by two years (Keider Montero and Madden are both 24).

It’s exciting to consider the strides Jobe can take while working with Detroit’s esteemed pitching coach, Chris Fetter. The highly-regarded instructor has taken pitchers like Madden, Hurter, Sean Guenther and Brennan Hanifee and significantly improved repertoires that are dwarfed by the elite stuff of Jobe.

Former Tigers GM Al Avila raised eyebrows when he took Jobe with the third overall pick in the 2021 draft, opting to pass up on highly-touted SS prospect Marcelo Mayer, who spent the entire 2024 season on the Dobule-A Portland Sea Dogs.