Heading into the 2025 baseball season, outfielder Walker Jenkins is the Twins’ top prospect and the No. 3 overall prospect in the sport, according to both MLB.com and ESPN. If he plays well this year, he’s got a real chance to be the No. 1 overall prospect in 2026.
That’s what ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel predicts will be the case in a year’s time. Right now, Jenkins trails Dodgers pitcher Roki Sasaki and Red Sox outfielder Roman Anthony on most top-100 lists. Sasaki doesn’t fit the typical prospect mold as a 23-year-old star coming over from Japan, so he’s guaranteed to be off the rankings next year.
Anthony, who turns 21 in May, finished last year at Triple-A and might lose his prospect status as well if he spends enough time on Boston’s roster in 2025.
Thus, if Jenkins lives up to the hype this season (but doesn’t make a surprisingly quick ascension to MLB), the fifth overall pick in the 2023 draft could go into next year as the consensus top prospect in baseball.
“Jenkins’ selling point is his plus-plus bat-to-ball skills, which is helped by his efficient swing, but that also maximizes his raw power, giving him 25ish-homer upside as well,” McDaniel wrote. “He’s a fine runner with good instincts who is mostly playing center field now and will be an option there, but will likely slide to a corner spot in the big leagues.
This wide base of skills and long track record makes Jenkins one of the safer and highest-probability regulars among teenage prospects in recent memory; he would’ve been the top overall pick in many drafts and should be the top prospect in baseball in the next 12 months.”
The Twins lucked into the opportunity to land Jenkins two years ago, moving up from 13th to fifth in the first-ever draft lottery, which happened to be a year where there were five players considered a tier above the rest.
Paul Skenes (1) is already an All-Star and both Dylan Crews (2) and Wyatt Langford (4) were also in the big leagues last year, but Jenkins has jumped ahead of Max Clark (3) as the top prospect picked out of high school in that class, and he might just have more upside than Crews and Langford. He’s the Twins’ top prospect since Byron Buxton pre-2016.
Jenkins, who turns 20 next week, hit .362 with a .989 OPS in 26 games between rookie ball and Low-A to begin his pro career in 2023.
He followed that up by hitting .282 with an .833 OPS in 82 games across four levels last year, spending most of his time at Low-A and High-A after missing time early in the season with a hamstring injury.
He had 32 extra-base hits, 58 RBI, 17 steals, and walked more than he struck out, eventually making his Double-A debut towards the end of the season.
Despite the solid numbers, Jenkins wasn’t satisfied with his first full season of professional ball.
“Being injured somewhat hindered the way I like to play,” Jenkins said at TwinsFest last month, via MLB.com’s Matthew Leach. “I had to be able to manage my body, and I wasn’t able to go what I felt like was full throttle all the time. … I have extremely high expectations for myself. I feel like last season, that was a below-average year for me. Like, I’m not happy with my performance last year. I want to do better. …
I’m always going to set extremely high expectations that almost feel out of reach, because I think that’s the only way I can get to where I want to be.”
Jenkins, who figures to begin this season at Double-A, will be looking to stay healthy and live up to his lofty internal expectations this season.
If he has success in Wichita, he should find himself at Triple-A St. Paul before the year is over, with a chance to make his MLB debut in early 2026 at 21 years old.
