South Side Sox Top Prospect No. 17: Jake Burger

It is a sheer delight to see our top-ranked third base prospect back in action!

Jake Burger

Third Baseman
6´2´´
230 pounds
Age: 25
SSS rank among all third basemen in the system: 1
2021 SSS Top Prospect Vote: 12
2020 SSHP Top Prospect Ranking: 25
2019 SSS Top Prospect Ranking: 9
2018 SSS Top Prospect Ranking: 8

First off, Jake Burger is very unlikely still the 230 pounds he’s listed at on Baseball-Reference, as he is fit and much more trim this season, as evidenced by the lead photo above, which could be captioned, “Burgatron Breaking Bad.”

Second, there’s not a lot to cover here that you’re not already aware of. Burger’s road to the majors has been slowed by injury after injury, including two Achilles tears in less than one year.

But let’s focus on the good stuff. Burger is back, lithe in the field, and raking at the plate. We first got a glimpse of that when he spoke to us at SSHP at Sports Illustrated last year from the alternate site in Schaumburg.

More recently, Burger spent some time talking about his road back to top prospect status with our Dan Victor, in a terrific, revealing piece here on SSS.

If everything holds, Burger will parlay his invite to major league spring training (he was added to the 40-man roster last fall, as well) into a successful stint at the alternate site in Schaumburg. When that camp breaks in May, Burger will find himself playing either in Birmingham or Charlotte; if the Barons, it could be a short stint before a call-up to Triple-A.