Source: Jackson Holliday is being promoted to Triple-A Norfolk

PHOENIX - Baseball's No. 1 prospect is moving on up. Again. Shortstop Jackson Holliday will play for his fourth team of the minor league season when he joins Triple-A Norfolk from Double-A Bowie this week, according to a source. 

Holliday, 19, will play his first game for the Tides on Tuesday at Harbor Park when Norfolk hosts Jacksonville at 6:35 p.m.

The Tides will play their next 12 games in Norfolk before capping off the regular season with a six-game series at Buffalo. After that, Norfolk will host a best-of-three International League championship series at Harbor Park that begins Sept. 26. If the Tides win that series they will play the Pacific Coast League winner in the Triple-A National Championship Game Sept. 30 in Las Vegas.

Holliday batted .396 with an OPS of 1.182 in 14 games at the start of the season with Single-A Delmarva. His first game with High-A Aberdeen was April 25, and in 57 games he batted .314 with a .940 OPS with the IronBirds. On July 14 he moved to Double-A Bowie and hit .338/.421/.507/.928 in 36 games with nine doubles, three triples, three homers and 15 RBIs.

So over 107 games for the year at three levels, Holliday has hit .333/.451/.517/.968 with 26 doubles, nine triples, 10 homers, 95 runs, 23 steals and 66 RBIs. He has walked 85 times with 101 strikeouts.

By reaching his fourth level this season at Triple-A, Holliday has exceeded his own expectations. He said last winter – and again this year – his goal was to advance to Double-A Bowie.

A few weeks ago, O's executive vice president/general manager Mike Elias did not rule out a promotion to the majors, but also made that sound unlikely. While that is probably not happening this year, Holliday advancing four levels is remarkable and just goes to put an accent on a remarkable year at age 19.

Taken with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2022 MLB Draft, Holliday is the O's third straight minor leaguer to move to No. 1 in top 100 rankings, following Adley Rutschman and Gunnar Henderson.

Holliday will join a Norfolk team that at 81-50 (.618) has the best record this year in the International League. And Holliday could play as many as 18 regular season games for the Tides and add a few more in the playoffs. 

In other promotion news from today, three 2023 Baltimore draft picks, including O's No. 1 pick Enrique Bradfield Jr., are moving from Delmarva to Aberdeen. He will be joined there by second-round pick Mac Horvath and Matthew Etzel, the club's 10th-round pick.

On the pitching side, Nolan Hoffman is moving from Bowie to Norfolk. Also Dylan Heid and Trey McGough are moving from Aberdeen to Bowie.

The Orioles beat Arizona 8-4 today to improve to 85-51. The game story from today is here.