Jones, Garrett

In your upcoming career as a professional gambler, we advise you to avoid bets that start with the phrase "It's not impossible that....." Which is prefatory to noting that it's not impossible that Garrett Jones will repeat his fine 2009 season.

After a minor league career mainly notable for it's length (he turned pro in 1999 and had a grand total of 77 major league at bats prior to 2009), it seemed likely that the post mortem on Jones would be that he owed his minor league longevity to being left-handed. Instead, he moved to the Pirates organization and between triple-A and the bigs hit 33 home runs, drove in 94 and for good measure stole 24 bases (previous career high 10). Jones put up a .939 OPS, a number he hadn't come within 50 points of since double-A ball in 2004 and his minor league numbers are .258/.312/.450. So we repeat..It's not impossible that this is not a one time deal. One can only say, whatever the pod people did with the real Garret Jones, we bet the Pirates would prefer to keep this version.

Which is not to say Jones might not be useful. The man is huge and the power is real. Even players with limited footspeed can steal bases on a semi-regular basis so I don't think you would be crazy to bet on 20 home runs and double digit steals. He's not going to get on-base at .372 (he never did before on any level), but he's likely to get on enough that he could score some runs. Basically his RBI numbers and Rs are in the hands of the other Bucs and it's not impossible that they will do alright. .280-70-23-85-10. 550ABs