On Monday afternoon the Cincinnati Reds called up outfielder Jacob Hurtubise. After going undrafted in the shortened-to-five-rounds 2020 draft, he signed with the Reds as a free agent. Since then he’s worked his way up the ladder. Monday saw all of the work he put in pay off as he became the 23,199th player in Major League Baseball history. But not only did he get to put the uniform on and sit in the dugout, he got into the game as he was called upon to pinch run for Mike Ford after he had tripled in the 8th inning. Hurtubise would be stranded at third, but he got his first taste of being on a big league field during a game.
The 26-year-old went to the US Military Academy at West Point. He played there for four seasons, breaking out as a junior when he hit .375/.541/.445. As a senior he had four hits in the first give games of the season before it was cancelled.
Major League Baseball instituted the draft in 1965. Since then there have been 14 players drafted from the the US Military Academy at West Point (three players were selected twice). Jacob Hurtubise is the first one to reach the Major Leagues *record scratch* – yes, Hurtubise was undrafted in 2020, but the Seattle Mariners did draft him in 2019 and he did not sign. He is the third player from the school to reach the big leagues.
Walt French was the first to do so and he had a career from 1923-1929. For nearly 100 years he remained the only attendee of West Point to reach the big leagues. French also played football and basketball, and was an All-American football player for Army. He, however, did not graduate from West Point and left in 1922.
Chris Rowley went undrafted in 2013 but signed as a free agent with the Toronto Blue Jays following the draft. He worked his way through their farm system and made his debut in August of 2017. He would pitch in eight big league games between 2017 and 2018 for the Blue Jays. He last pitched in the winter of 2019 in the Puerto Rican Winter League – throwing one inning for Mayaguez.
As for Hurtubise, things are a little bit different today than they were for much of the time in professional sports when it comes to military duties for graduates of the military academies. Rowley, for example, missed several seasons as he served his required duty before returning to baseball. A relatively new policy allows military service academy graduates seen with a realistic chance to play professional sports to delay their obligations to the military. Hurtubise was one of the first athletes granted that option.
Having the option to immediately continue one’s athletic endeavors certainly plays into the favor of having a successful career. Hurtubise was able to benefit from that and in 2023 he had his breakout season as he hit .330/.479/.483 while playing for Double-A Chattanooga and Triple-A Louisville. The previous offseason he worked out at Driveline trying to increase his power output after hitting just one home run in his entire life up to that point. In 2023 he came out and hit seven home runs – six of them went over the fence. But he also walked more than he struck out and had 45 stolen bases in 119 games played.
Following the season the Reds added him to the 40-man roster to protect him from the Rule 5 draft. This season began with Hurtubise in Triple-A with the Bats, but in his third game he dove for a ball while playing left field and had to exit the game with a shoulder injury. He didn’t return to the field until May when he joined the Arizona Complex League Reds for three games on a rehab assignment. Then he moved up to Dayton to continue his rehab assignment, playing three games last week with the Dragons. With TJ Friedl breaking his thumb on Sunday in San Francisco, the Reds called up Hurtubise directly from his own rehab assignment to join the team in Arizona.
Brandon Williamson to rehab with Dayton
Cincinnati is sending left-handed starter Brandon Williamson on a rehab assignment tonight with the Dayton Dragons. He’s expected to start their game against the Great Lakes Loons at 7:05pm ET.