Just as the parent Houston Astros are flexing their muscles and battling their way to the top of the AL West, the team’s Double-A affiliate Corpus Christi Hooks are booming their way to the top of the Texas League South Division. They’re duking it out with the Midland RockHounds (Oakland A’s) and San Antonio Missions (San Diego Padres) in an early season king-of-the-hill tussle.

One of the kingpins of the Hooks’ lineup is starting first baseman, Taylor Jones. He’s overshadowed by more highly-touted prospects, outfielders Yordan Alvarez (Houston’s #4 ranked prospect, second in the Texas League in RBIs with 17 through April 24) and Myles Straw (#21, leading the TL with 12 steals and second with a .506 OBP). Straw, in fact, made MLB Pipeline’s Prospect Team of the Week for the week of April 16-22.

Related: Jose Altuve Tutors Myles Straw

Jones actually bats cleanup in the Hooks’ lineup, as Straw sets the table at the top, and Alvarez hits third. This potent combination has more than done their part to push the Hooks to the top of the League in doubles with 41, RBIs (109), stolen bases (30), and team batting average with .291 (through April 24).

Related: Jones Leads Gang of 8 Hooks to Texas League All-Star Game

UPDATE: On May 7, the Astros’ player development department announced that Taylor Jones was named the Houston Astros’ Minor League Player of the Month for April.

In 19 games with the Hooks for the month, Jones hit .354 on 23-for-65, with 10 doubles, three homers, 17 RBI, and a 1.109 OPS (.463 OBP, .646 slugging), while drawing 13 walks against 16 strikeouts.

During April, he ranked among the Top 5 Texas League players in OPS (3rd), slugging percentage (3rd), doubles (3rd), on-base percentage (4th), and RBI (tied for 5th).

UPDATE, June 28: With AJ Reed being recalled to the Astros, Jones is bound for the AAA Fresno Grizzlies! Jones, tabbed Tuesday as the Texas League All-Star Game MVP, leads the circuit with a .987 OPS. Congrats, Taylor!

Related: Astros’ AAA Pitching Prospect, Josh James, Finds Focus, Fire, & Victory

The Evergreen State

Taylor Michael Jones was born on December 6, 1993, in Kent, Washington, 20 miles south of Seattle. A two-sport star for Kentwood High School in nearby Covington, he once scored 16 points as a junior basketball player in 2010. At the time, the lean 6’7″, 188-pounder listed his greatest athletic moments as winning both the basketball and baseball state championships for the Conquerors.

Mathematically curious, Jones’ favorite subjects at Kentwood were pre-calculus and trigonometry. When quizzed for his yearbook about whom he would invite to dinner, Jones hesitated only slightly before mentioning pop stars Drake and Beyonce, promising to serve Fettucini Alfredo.

Jones’ high school-era iPod was filled with the music of Drake, Wiz Khalifa, and J. Cole. A favorite book of his at the time was 1996’s “RL’s Dream” by Walter Mosley, a novel about a black musician in New York who is evicted for non-payment of rent and is taken in by a white woman living nearby. You can learn a lot about a person by the books he reads.

Bring on the Zags…and the Cubs?

After considering Baylor and the University of San Diego as possible colleges, Jones chose Gonzaga University in Spokane, nearly 300 miles east of Covington. There, he focused on baseball, particularly pitching for the Bulldogs, relieving in his freshman year, while exclusively starting in his sophomore season in 2014, working to a 4-3 record, with a 4.68 ERA in 14 starts. Control was an issue, as he yielded 33 walks (4.07 BB/9), with 51 strikeouts (6.29 K/9) in his 73 innings pitched.

Jones wrapped up his career with the Bulldogs moving to first base for his junior and senior years, thus building his offensive prowess to position himself for the draft.

Jones was actually drafted following his junior year. He was the Chicago Cubs’ 35th-round pick, the eighth pick of the round, and 1,043rd overall in the 2015 draft. Hoping that a return for his senior year might improve his draft status, he chose not to sign with Chicago. His hunch and his belief in himself paid off.

Coming into his senior season at Gonzaga, Jones had big expectations, especially after rolling the draft dice following the Cubs snub, according to the Gonzaga Bulletin. He was coming off a first-team All-West Coast Conference (WCC) season where he led GU with a .358 batting average (second in the WCC). He was also second in both slugging and on-base percentages after joining the starting lineup. In just 44 games, he amassed 48 hits, 30 RBIs, 24 runs, and five home runs. As a senior, he batted .332 and was tied for second in the nation with 27 doubles.

Taylor Jones was drafted by Houston in the 19th round of the 2016 draft. He gave the Gonzaga newspaper his thoughts on the many adjustments he’s had to make going from college to the pro game:

“It’s the everyday grind. In college you’re playing a series on the weekend, and maybe a game or two during the middle of the week. But in pro ball you’re playing every day,” Jones said. “Being able to mentally keep your focus that many days in a row can be tough. It’s something that’s definitely different than college ball.”

Along the way, too, Jones was happy to throw some props in the direction of the Gonzaga program: “The main thing was how to prepare, and get yourself into a work ethic routine,” Jones told the Bulletin. “At GU a lot of things were really structured around the team, and the coaches getting on you about getting your work done, and I think that kind of prepared me and got me ready to do that on my own.”

Scouting Report

This Taylor Jones scouting report was filed by The Baseball Draft Report in spring 2016, about three months prior to the draft that landed him in Houston:

“Taylor Jones is a risky pick, as guys with long levers bring that boom/bust aspect to hitting. The boom of Jones’s power currently outweighs any bust I feel about his long-term ability to make consistent contact as a pro.

“The fact that he’s more than just a slugger helps give some wiggle room. Jones is an average runner who fields his position really well. He’s also capable of moonlighting on the mound thanks to an upper-80s fastball and up-and-down curve.”

First Year Pro All-Star

Following draft day, Jones played the summer of 2016 at Houston’s short-season Class-A Tri-City ValleyCats, and promptly earned a spot on the New York-Penn League All-Star team. He told reporters at the time that the Astros organization has made some adjustments to his swing, which has caused some inconsistency in his game, but overall, he felt his progress was going well.

It’s possible those “adjustments” may have been power and swing-path related, a system-wide Houston phenomenon TRS covered recently, here. “It’s definitely been a cool experience,” Jones said that summer. “I’ve had to switch up my swing a little bit, but I’ve been playing well enough, and I made the All-Star team.” Now carrying 225 pounds on his 6’7″ frame, adding consistent power to his game seems well within reach.

Jones spent his 2017 evenly split between Houston’s full-season Class A Quad Cities River Bandits and Advanced-A Buies Creek Astros, and hit a combined .222, with 13 doubles, a triple and seven home runs in 105 games. Consistent contact was a need to be addressed, last season, as Jones walked 45 times, but struck out 101 times in his 365 ABs. With his OBP a weak .314, his 2017 OPS was a combined .634.

Hoops to Hooks

Having Houston start Jones back at Buies Creek at the start of 2018 wouldn’t have seemed too shocking, with last season’s numbers in mind. But, the Texas League has been good to him and for him, as he’s racked up a .358 batting average in his first 15 games for Houston’s Double-A Corpus Christi Hooks affiliate.

Through games of April 24, Jones is second in the Texas League in doubles, with eight, tied for fourth place with 14 RBIs, and is seventh in OPS with 1.067. His on-base percentage has done an upturn, too, as his .444 ranks seventh in the league. Early returns have his walk total at eight, with his strikeouts a manageable 13.

Jones has hit safely in seven of his last 10 games, collecting four straight multi-hit games and back-to-back three-RBI games during a series in Frisco (Texas Rangers’ affiliate) last week (April 19-22).

If Jones continues improving, it wouldn’t be surprising to see the 24-year-old promoted to AAA Fresno mid-summer, although he’d have to elbow his way around Grizzlies first basemen Tyler White, JD Davis, and AJ Reed, all but the latter able to play multiple positions. One or more of those three might need to be promoted to Houston (all three have been there before) for Jones to have room on the Fresno roster.

Related: Jones’ Hooks Teammate Randy Cesar Lets Bat Do The Talking