The Tigers enter the 2024 season with high hopes in Detroit, and with a farm full of exciting young players. A few of them are descending on the bigs.
According to various industry rankings, the Tigers have as many as six top-100 prospects in baseball. Two of their consensus top three could be in Detroit this season, including 22-year-old Colt Keith, who just signed a six-year extension with the Tigers and is expected to win the job as their Opening Day second basemen. Fast-rising pitcher Jackson Jobe, 21, could join Keith in Detroit by the end of the season, perhaps for a playoff push.
The Tigers' No. 1 prospect is still a long ways from the majors, 19-year-old outfielder Max Clark. The third overall pick in last year's draft, Clark is viewed as a potential superstar in a similar mold to 23-year-old Riley Greene. Between Clark, Greene and 24-year-old Parker Meadows, who made his MLB debut last season, the Tigers have the makings of a dynamic outfield for years -- and years and years -- to come.
Clark, Keith, Jobe and Meadows are four of six Tigers among baseball's top-100 prospects, according to ESPN's MLB insider Kiley McDaniel. That's tied for most in the game. Also cracking the list: 23-year-old infielder Jace Jung, the 12th overall pick in 2022 who will be tested in Triple-A Toledo this season, and 19-year-old infielder Kevin McGonigle, the 37th overall pick in 2023 who raked in his first taste of professional action last summer.
McDaniel actually ranks Jobe as the Tigers' top prospect at No. 10 overall, comparing him to Braves ace Spencer Strider, "with better offspeed stuff." Strider won 20 games last season and led the majors in strikeouts. McDaniel has Clark at No. 15, comparing him to reigning NL Rookie of the Year Corbin Carroll, Keith at No. 40, Meadows at No. 45, Jung at No. 63 and McGonigle at No. 95.
Other outlets aren't quite as bullish on the Tigers' farm system. The Athletic says Detroit has five top-100 prospects (minus McGonigle), tied for second most in baseball, and MLB Pipeline says it has four (minus McGonigle and Meadows).
But they all agree on this: the Tigers have two of the highest-upside position players and pitchers in the game in Clark and Jobe and two infield bats with legitimate middle-of-the-order potential in Keith and Jung. If and when they all reach Detroit, where a nucleus of young talent is already taking shape, the Tigers should once again start throwing their weight around in the AL Central.