TAMPA — Tim Corbin fielded plenty of calls this winter from people around the game of baseball.
The longtime Vanderbilt head coach, who just won his 1,000th career game this week, has plenty of former players in the big leagues or somewhere on their way there. But teams wanted to know about one of his former players in particular: a 6-foot-6, 22-year-old center fielder who arrived at Vanderbilt in the fall of 2019 as a two-way player.
Spencer Jones was not exactly available — Hal Steinbrenner said last month he was hesitant to give up someone such as Jones — but teams who were considering trades with the Yankees wanted to know more about the top prospect and how he might project down the road.
“You could tell they were snooping around a little bit and saying, ‘What’s it going to take?’” Corbin said in a phone interview this week. “I told them the truth: That kid’s gonna play. I don’t know your organizations, but I feel like he’s gonna play there and help.”
