Jordan McCants looking to build off educational 2023

2023 was a year full of education for infielder Jordan McCants. A third-round draft pick by the Marlins out of his northwest Florida high school in 2021, McCants came out of the short-season leagues and embarked upon his first full season in affiliated ball when he was assigned to the Low-A Jupiter Hammerheads.

From very early on through the bulk of the season, the first lesson McCants learned was the importance of adjusting to your surroundings. Not only was McCants tasked with learning how to see and contact pitching at a more advanced level and for a longer period of time, he also faced some unique circumstances related to where his team called home. After spending much of the first half of the season at Roger Dean Chevrolet Stadium, the Hammerheads were required to move to the Ballpark of the Palm Beaches ahead of planed construction in Jupiter.

“We just had to make it work,” McCants told Erik Bremer during the Pensacola Blue Wahoos' annual Fish Fest on Thursday. “Our manager said, 'It’s minor league ball. You have to make it work.' We’re still gonna show up every day, we’re still going to play hard. We’re still gonna get our work in. We may not have as many resources as we had, but it all turned out great.”

The "great" McCants speaks of is how the season ended for the nomadic Jupiter Hammerheads. Despite the turbulent nature of their ballpark situation and their limited access to resources, the club rode a second-half division title through to a championship. The second lesson McCants learned: the importance of contributing to winning culture.

“Our team chemistry was incredible. We all just came together as one to be brothers and really play for each other,” McCants said. “Our manager and faculty engrained that into us early. We all just embraced it.”

Leading to the Hammerheads winning it all, McCants was front and center for some standout moments, most notably his walk-off sacrifice bunt in extra innings during the first playoff game against Palm Beach.

“It was a day I’ll never forget. My mom passed in 2022 on that day. That same day, I had to wake up and play a playoff game,” McCants recalled. “I went out and got a walk off. It was a blessing and a great feeling.”

For Mom 💕
It was an emotional Game 1 win for @GoHammerheads⁩ Jordan McCants as he shared that Tues. was also the 1 yr anniversary of losing his mom Felicia to cancer. “It’s bigger than baseball.” 💕 pic.twitter.com/M3ycbtX46V

— Lisa Pride (@LisaHPride) September 14, 2023

Strength through adversity this past year allowed McCants to learn another very important lesson: the importance of mental fortuity.

“Baseball is a game of failure. You gotta be tough mentally,” McCants said. “Trying to build that over a full affiliated year and actually seeing how a full season works was great.”

Tangibly, on the baseball field, McCants learned a new position in 2023. Accustomed to being a shortstop and second baseman until that point in his career, McCants played 55 games at third base. According to McCants, the learning curve was immediate and stark.

“It has its moments. That’s the hot corner. I remember Opening Day, Paul DeJong was rehabbing for the Cardinals and he hit one right at me at 105 [miles per hour],” McCants said. “It’s just reaction time. It was fun playing over there. I played a lot more than I thought I was going to play over there.”

Off the field, McCants is always cognizant of where he started and where he came from. Last year, he once again won the Marlins’ organizational award as Service Member of the Year.

“Being from a small place, we don’t have a lot of resources,” McCants said this past September in Miami after the awards ceremony. “For the youth to see a professional baseball player come back and just to one of their little league games or something, just being there and being that face. It means everything. It’s bigger than baseball; it always has been.”

Already this winter, McCants attended his third straight Fish Fest in Pensacola.

For the remainder of 2024, McCants hopes to further embrace and continue to instill what he learned and took away from 2023. Asked what his goals are, he had one simple answer: “Another championship. I don’t care what level I’m on.”

In the current state, all signs point to McCants beginning the year with the High-A Beloit Sky Carp. In being proactive, McCants stated he’s planning ahead (“I’m going to bring at least five jackets”).

McCants, still 21, exhibits 70-grade speed that allowed him to steal 36 bases this past year, solid defensive flexibility, a still-growing frame that he has already added 25+ pounds to since being drafted, and a growing knowledge of who he is as a baseball player. If he can come by more bat speed and put the ball in play more consistently, he is a strong candidate to turn heads this coming season.