Blue Jays: Max Pentecost retires from baseball

Max Pentecost has retired from baseball, according to a recent report. He spent the 2018 season with the Double-A New Hampshire Fisher Cats.

According to Chris Cotillo of MassLive and Andersen Pickard of MLB Daily Dish, Blue Jays minor-leaguer Max Pentecost has retired from baseball.

Earlier in the spring, Shi Davidi of Sportsnet reported that Pentecost had left the team’s major-league camp to “consider his future”.

Pentecost, 26, was drafted by the Blue Jays in the first round of the 2014 MLB Draft, two picks ahead of Washington’s Trea Turner and one pick behind Michael Conforto of the New York Mets.

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Once considered to be one of the organization’s top prospects, he spent his first professional season with the Vancouver Canadians and Gulf Coast League Blue Jays, boasting an OPS of .749 in 25 games.

Consistently unable to stay healthy, Pentecost, a native of Winder, Georgia, averaged just 78 games over the next three seasons, playing primarily for the High-A Dunedin Blue Jays and Low-A Lansing Lugnuts.

This past season, he appeared in 89 games for the Double-A New Hampshire Fisher Cats, slashing .253/.283/.401 with 10 home runs, 52, and 17 doubles in 344 at-bats.

This spring, he went 2-for-7 with a home run in five games for the Blue Jays, striking out three times and racking up just five total bases.

If this is indeed the end, he will finish up his minor-league career with 260 games played, 29 home runs, 159 RBI, 52 doubles, and a slash line of .280/.323/.435.

Primarily a catcher, the Kennesaw State University product also logged 194.1 career innings at first base. He also appeared briefly as a designated hitter at various points throughout his career.

Unfortunately for both Pentecost and the Blue Jays, he wasn’t able to ever crack a big league roster, showing once again the innate variability in baseball prospects.