For the past couple years, power-hitting strikeout machine outfielder Spencer Jones has been one of the most polarizing of all the highly-regarded Yankees prospects.

He mesmerizes fans with his Aaron Judge-like power as he hits home runs that are measured on the Richter scale. But he also drives you nuts because his swing and miss is off the charts. Think Giancarlo Stanton when he’s enduring one of those awful weeks where he swings and misses at pitches that he couldn’t hit with a six-foot bat.

The highs and lows with Jones have been staggering, and it was beginning to feel like he was going to end up being nothing more to the Yankees than a trade chip because there was also the matter of the crowded roster - there was no place for him, especially once Trent Grisham and Cody Bellinger returned to the team.

Well, now there is.

The No. 25 overall draft pick in the 2022 draft will turn 25 years old on May 14, and there’s a good chance he’s going to be celebrating his quarter-century birthday somewhere in the big city while the Yankees enjoy their next day off between their series in Baltimore and the one they’ll play next weekend against the crosstown rival Mets at Citi Field.

That’s because the Yankees’ No. 6 prospect on MLB Pipeline is finally going to make his MLB debut this weekend when the Yankees play the Brewers in Milwaukee. Jones is being called up from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre because Jasson Dominguez crashed into the left-field wall at Yankee Stadium Thursday and suffered a concussion and sprained shoulder which will send him to the injured list.

With Stanton also on the IL, Jones now has a chance and it’s going to be fascinating to see what he does with this opportunity.

Jones has been unable to break into MLB because for all of his majestic home runs - 83 across 415 games as he has made his way through the system - the athletic 6-foot-7, 240-pounder can’t stop striking out. He whiffed a staggering 36.8% of the time at Double-A in 2024, then it was 33.7% in 2025 before he moved up to Triple-A. When he got there, nothing changed as he closed 2025 at a 35.4% clip and thus far in 2026, it’s still an untenable 32.4%.

Of 217 qualified Triple-A hitters, only 14 have a worse strikeout rate. As for qualified MLB hitters, only seven are currently striking out in more than 33% of their at bats.

However, when the kid makes contact, it’s something to see and in 100 Triple-A games his slash line is .269/.350/..567 for an OPS of .917.

Jones started slowly this year and through eight games - a few of which I watched live in Rochester - he struck out 51.4% of the time and he looked about as unlikely to get to the Yankees as you or I. But since then he has started to find his way, cutting that rate in half to 25.7% and his 41 RBI in 33 games lead all of Triple-A while his 11 homers are tied for second.

“Feel like the last three, four weeks, been having a lot of consistent at-bats,” Aaron Boone said Thursday when it became known Jones was coming to the show. “The power’s been there. Less swing and miss. The signs have been encouraging.”

Jones can play all three outfield positions and DH but his best position is center field. The difference between him and Dominguez is that Jones is a solid defender, so that could pave the way for playing time as Aaron Judge can get off his feet and DH in Stanton’s absence, and then Boone can figure out where to play Jones, Grisham and Bellinger. My guess is they’ll DH him so he can concentrate solely on hitting.

“That’s a large man that hits the ball very far,” Bellinger said of Jones. “Honestly, a freak athlete, too. I didn’t know (about) the speed. He’s very athletic, moves well, so yeah, just a good baseball player.”

Ryan McMahon added, "I'm a big fan of Spencer's. He can do a lot of good things on the baseball field.”

➤ The Yankees kept on rolling as they overcame a terrible first inning from erratic rookie Elmer Rodriguez and roared back to win their fifth straight game. Rodriguez made his second MLB start, both against the Rangers, and like the first, this was a grind and with Carlos Rodon ready to return, it’s probably the last time we’ll see Rodriguez for a little while.

➤ Rodriguez had zero command in the first inning as he threw 37 pitches which led to three runs. He started walk, walk, single to load the bases, then Joc Pederson’s sac fly, Ezequiel Duran’s RBI single, a hit by pitch and a wild pitch delivered the runs. It was brutal, and Ryan Yarbrough was already warming in the bullpen. However, credit to the kid as he wobbled to the dugout to recover, then came out and kept it right there before exiting with two outs in the fifth. His final line was six hits and four walks with just two strikeouts.

➤ The bullpen got the final 13 outs and it dealt with self-induced traffic very well. Brent Headrick inherited a bases loaded jam in the fifth and escaped, then went 1-2-3 in the sixth. Tim Hill wasn’t good as he gave up two singles, but Fernando Cruz got out of it. Cruz then made his own mess in the eighth as he loaded the bases, but David Bednar came in and put out that fire. Bednar did give up a run in the ninth, but by then it didn’t matter. In all, the bullpen inherited eight baserunners and stranded them all.

➤ Down 3-0 and facing Jacob deGrom felt like a death sentence, but the red-hot Yankees raked him for six runs on seven hits and a walk, knocking him out in the seventh. Aaron Judge and Cody Bellinger hit back-to-back doubles for a run in the first, Ryan McMahon hit a tying two-run homer in the second, and Jazz Chisholm - who is still looking terrible at the plate - put the Yankees up 4-3 with a homer in the sixth.

➤ And then in the seventh, two big runs came home which gave the bullpen some breathing room. McMahon singled and Jose Caballero bunted for a single to end deGrom’s night. After a two-out intentional walk to Judge, Bellinger made the Rangers pay as he roped a two-run double to right, and Paul Goldschmidt’s solo homer tacked on in the eighth. This was the first time deGrom lost back-to-back starts to the same team since 2016 when he was with the Mets

➤ There wasn’t great news on the rehab trail. Both Rodon at Triple-A and Gerrit Cole at Single-A turned in lousy outings. Aaron Boone said Cole is definitely still a little ways away, but he remained confident that Rodon will be ready to pitch Sunday in Milwaukee.

➤ Splat went the five-game winning streak. The Yankees were certainly due for a clunker and this was it as they were dominated once again by Nathan Eovaldi for the second time in a week, and about the 20th time in his career. It’s truly amazing how the Yankees’ bats turn into toothpicks when they face this guy. Seriously, it’s a hopeless endeavor when he’s on the mound and thankfully, unless they meet in the playoffs, the Yankees are done with him until next year.

➤ Eovaldi pitched eight innings and allowed three hits with no walks and eight strikeouts, the only run coming when Judge homered in the sixth. He threw 101 pitches, 72 for strikes, a mismatch in every way. Good riddance.

➤ Will Warren was terrible, plain and simple. He had allowed just 10 earned runs in his first seven starts, but the Rangers lit him up for six on seven hits and three walks in four innings. He just didn’t have it.

➤ Corey Seager homered in the first and Texas put up three in the fourth and at that point, with Eovaldi dealing, this one was over. In the fourth, Brandon Nimmo walked, Duran doubled him home, and after two outs, Evan Carter hit a two-run homer. Two more runs came home in the fourth as Warren walked two, Duran had a sac fly and Seager an RBI single.

➤ Yerry de los Santos, up from Triple-A, saved the bullpen by eating 3.1 scoreless innings. He threw a career-high 54 pitches and gave up just one hit and one walk while whiffing five before Yarbrough mopped up. After the game, Boone announced that scheduled Thursday starter Ryan Weathers would be scratched due to an illness, so de los Santos giving the bullpen a break turned out to be a big thing.

➤ When the Yankees took the field for this getaway day matinee, it sure felt like achieving a sixth straight series victory was going to be a little difficult. Paul Blackburn was the starting pitcher in a one-inning opener role, and he was going to be followed by Triple-A callup Brendan Beck who would be making his MLB debut. Meanwhile, the starting lineup included Jasson Dominguez in left, Amed Rosario at third, Max Schuemann at short and JC Escarra behind the plate. What is this, March 7 instead of May 7?

➤ Schuemann started because Caballero got drilled in the elbow by a pitch Wednesday and while he stayed in the game, he did not start this one. Rosario was in because the Rangers were throwing lefty MacKenzie Gore. Judge got a DH day so Bellinger played right with Dominguez in left. But then things went haywire when Dominguez crashed into the wall making a catch on the first out of the game and he had to come out, so Boone had to do some further lineup juggling as Bellinger went to left, Rosario to right, and McMahon came in to play third. None of this mattered because the Yankees offense, after five feeble innings against Gore, exploded for six runs in the sixth.

➤ Like Eovaldi, Gore was muting the Yankees but it all fell apart as Bellinger walked, Rosario singled, and after an out, McMahon walked to load the bases. Grisham then laced a three-run double to the gap in left-center, ruining Gore’s performance and ending his day. But the Yankees weren’t done as they managed a walk and three singles to plate three more for a 7-2 lead. It was the third time in the last five games they’ve had an inning where they scored at least six runs.

➤ Schuemann had his first hit and RBI as a Yankee with a double in the seventh, and McMahon had an RBI single in the eighth, capping a day where he had two hits and two walks to raise his average to .213 and his on-base to .311.

➤ Beck wasn’t effective as he allowed two runs on two hits and three walks, but he gave the Yankees three innings and at least kept them in it. Once he was out, Hill, Headrick, Jake Bird and Camilo Doval delivered five scoreless innings.

➤ The Yankees went 6-1 on the homestand and in those games, they outscored Baltimore and Texas 47-20 and scored 27 runs with two outs.

➤ Despite all that great work, the lead in the AL East is down to a half-game because the god damn Rays apparently are never going to lose again. I can’t believe we’re living in a world where the Rays are once again a team to worry about, but they have now won seven straight and 13 of their last 14. I look at that team, and I can’t fathom how it’s possible. They’re never going to go away.

The Yankees head back out for another long road trip, nine games in 10 days in three cities, though it ends with the first half of the Subway Series at Citi Field. Milwaukee, the three-time defending NL Central champ, has gotten off to a sluggish 18-16 start and one of the reasons is this team can’t slug. It has 24 homers in 34 games to rank 29th, ahead of only the punchless Giants.

However, the Brewers score runs in other ways, in part because their team .337 on-base percentage is fourth-best in MLB, slightly ahead of the Yankees who are sixth at .334. This is also a good pitching staff with an ERA of 3.60, fifth-best in MLB, and it has allowed the fewest home runs with 28. And the Yankees will have to face dominant ace Jacob Misiorowski in the opener Friday which figures to be maddening in Nathan Eovaldi ways.

➤ C William Contreras: He has become one of the best two-way catchers in the game, very good defensively and he’s slashing .286/.358/.406 with an OPS of .764 and a team-high 23 RBI.

➤ 2B Bruce Turang: He’s the ultimate pest as he leads the NL with a .439 on-base, leads the Brewers with a .956 OPS, and has 22 RBI.

➤ 1B Andrew Vaughn: Just returned from the IL and homered Wednesday to help beat the Cardinals.

➤ OF Jackson Chourio: One of the young rising stars in MLB, he made his season debut early in the week and already has reached base safely in seven of 10 plate appearances.

➤ RP DL Hall: The lefty leads the Brewers bullpen with a 1.59 ERA in his setup role.