Jacob Hurtubise

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Jacob Gilles Hurtubise

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Biographical Information[edit]

Outfielder Jacob Hurtubise attended the United States Military Academy in West Point, NY, from which he was drafted by the Seattle Mariners in the 39th round of the 2019 amateur draft. On talent alone, he may have gone higher, although it should be noted that he had not hit a single homer during his stint at the academy, but there was a question about how his future service commitments would impact his future as a player. In any case, he declined an offer to sign with the club.

In 2020, he took advantage of a new service policy that allowed him to defer service until after his sports career in order to sign as a free agent with the Cincinnati Reds after being passed over in the 2020 amateur draft, that was shortened to just five rounds by the COVID-19 pandemic. He was in fact the first baseball player to benefit from the change in policy. He hit extremely well in the Reds' minor league system, batting .283 with 77 runs in 102 games for the Dayton Dragons in 2021, and was named an organizational All-Star for the Reds. In 2022 he finally hit his first homer since his high school days for the Chattanooga Lookouts of the Southern League, and that came on the final day of the season. That year, his slash line was .250/.385/.308 in 63 games, a prototypical line for a lead-off hitter. In 2023, he was named the Reds minor league position player of the year and an organizational All-Star for the second time when he combined to hit .330 with 102 runs in 119 games between Chattanooga and the AAA Louisville Bats. On April 8th, he was involved in one of the strangest plays of the year when his routine fly ball to center field was completely missed by Jeremiah Jackson of the Rocket City Trash Pandas, who was new to the position, allowing the bases to clear; what made that special was that Ben Joyce was attempting to complete a no-hitter with two outs in the final inning of the game, and after more mayhem followed, Chattanooga won the game, 7-5, in spite of being no-hit!

He was invited to the Reds' spring training in 2024. While he started the season on the injured list with a right shoulder strain and spent time in the Arizona Complex League and the Midwest League before heading to Louisville, he had only played three games in AAA when he was called up to Cincinnati on May 13th following an injury to T.J. Friedl. He made his debut that day as a pinch-runner for DH Mike Ford in the 8th inning of a 6-5 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks, but he failed to score. He was only the third West Point alumnus to make it into a major league game, following Walter French and Chris Rowley, and only Rowley and him had graduated from the Academy.

His first, middle and last name could have him dropped in the middle of Quebec with no one batting an eyelid, but there is no evidence that he speaks any French.

Further Reading[edit]

  • Mark Sheldon: "West Point grad heads to Reds camp with MLB debut in his sights", mlb.com, January 31, 2024. [1]
  • Mark Sheldon: "Hurtubise becomes second West Point alum to play in MLB", mlb.com, May 14, 2024. [2]

Related Sites[edit]

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