The Scottsdale Scorpions of the 2026 Arizona Fall League just got a big upgrade. It was announced on Sunday that 21-year-old outfielder Zyhir Hope, one of two big pieces in the Detroit Tigers trade of Tarik Skubal to the Los Angeles Dodgers, will play in the Fall League this season. This will be his second run in the Fall League after playing in 2024 as well. Rafael Neda, the Milwaukee Brewers’ Complex League manager and minor league field coordinator, will manage the Scorpions this fall.
Hope finished the regular season with the Double-A Erie SeaWolves after the trade, and played at that level in both organizations. He hit 29 home runs and stole 26 bases, posting a combined 128 wRC+ with a 25 percent strikeout rate and an 11.1 percent walk rate. There were some struggles making the transition after the trade, but Hope is finishing the season at a torrid clip with three home runs and an OPS of 1.094 in 10 games in September.
Currently, MLB Pipeline has Hope as the Tigers top ranked prospect, while others prefer Bryce Rainer. Either way, that duo is 1-2 in the system, apart from a few sites that still have 28-year-old River Ryan listed as a prospect or haven’t updated as Max Clark cleared the 130 at-bats threshold to graduate from prospect status.
There is a lot to like in Hope’s game. He gets the barrel to the ball to all fields, and is just a hair shy of 70 grade raw power at this point. Combined with above average speed, a quality arm from right field, and a pretty disciplined approach at the plate, and you have a future power hitting outfielder who provides value defensively and on the basepaths as well.
The big question in his case is whether he can trim a little more swing and miss from his game. At just 21 years old and having been bounced around from the Cubs to the Dodgers to the Tigers over the past two seasons, he has had a lot to deal with, and yet he continues to do a lot of damage and take his walks. The strikeout rate is still a little higher than we’d prefer, but for a player his age already at the Double-A level, he’s doing just fine. The raw power and natural loft in his left-handed swing, and his ability to hit the ball hard in all parts of the zone bode well for him being a pretty productive big leaguer either way, but until he trims a bit more swing and miss from his game there’s still a fair amount of risk in the profile.
In that sense, he and Rainer are similiar prospects. Both provide value with their glove and on the bases, and both possess huge power for their age. But in both cases they need to address a few elements of their approach to strike out less as they advance. Hope is certainly further along than Rainer in that regard, but he’s also more experienced. Neither is the type of can’t miss, pure hitter that McGonigle and Clark were as they came through the ranks in recent years. However, they aren’t one dimensional sluggers either and could do major damage in the middle of the Tigers’ order in the years to come.
Last season, the Tigers sent Kevin McGonigle to the Fall League to work on his defense with Alan Trammell. Max Anderson and infielder Jack Penney also went to the Fall League for similar reasons, as both McGonigle and Anderson were too advanced as hitters for the caliber of pitching you tend to see in the desert. The Fall League is used largely to give extra reps to players who missed time during the season, and there are often a lot of pitchers just building up reps and not really very dialed in as the five week season gets underway in early October.
The Tigers haven’t made any other announcements about their Fall League roster. They do have several pitchers who missed a lot of time, but returned to throw well in July and August. Whether former top draft picks like Owen Hall, Paul Wilson, or Michael Massey will attend to try and build on their late season progress remains to be seen. Lefty Jake Miller, already on the 40-man roster, has missed nearly the whole season, but whether he’ll be available in October is pretty unclear. Maybe the best option is right-hander Kelvis Salcedo. The 20-year-old has outstanding stuff, among the best in the whole of the Tigers’ system, but he battled some minor injuries throughout the year and only managed 36.2 innings. He finished the season healthy and throwing well, so it would be great to see him get the call.
One other interesting possibility is catcher-first baseman Josue Briceño. After wrist surgery that cost him the first half of the season, Briceño got right back to destroying Double-A pitching. A 15 game promotion to Triple-A Toledo got off to a shaky start, and then he sprained an ankle on a slide on August 30 and hasn’t played since. Depending on the severity of the injury, he may not be available when the Fall League starts, but if he is, getting him some more reps to close out the season, especially at first base where he’s likely bound but hasn’t played a whole lot yet, might be a wise idea. On the other hand Briceño absolutely destroyed Fall League pitching in 2024 as a 19-year-old, winning league MVP as well as pulling off the Triple Crown, so it may not be worth much other than to get him some added defensive reps.
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