Roch on Jones

[Say O!]

I think we've seen improvements in certain areas. Jones had career highs in doubles, homers, stolen bases and OPS+ last year. It was the best offensive season of his career, and frankly it might have been better except he hurt his thumb and his numbers went down in September as a result. If I were a betting man, I'd say I like Jones' chances to have an even better offensive year in 2012.

Defensively, I thought Jones was better in 2011 than in 2010, though he did make several careless errors. He set a career high for assists, and generally, I thought he did a better job of positioning himself to make throws. I felt he did a better job of not letting balls get over his head. There is room for improvement, for sure.

In the end, I feel Jones still has some upside, though his plate discipline will always be a problem for him.

Jones numbers through Aug 20th:

.299 AVG

.335 OBP

.495 SLG

22 HRs (160 game pace for this is roughly 30 HRs)

.323 BABiP (would think this is "normal"ish territory for Jones, so not overly lucky and due for regression)

Those numbers are pretty much star level in CF with league average defense. Would think that would translate to wRC+ of 120ish. For context (per fangraphs), BJ Upton put up a wRC+ of 115 with basically league average defense over 153 games. His 2011 WAR = 4.1.