When Jackson Finley came out of Richmond Hill High School he was rated as one of the top baseball prospects in the state so it came as no surprise when he was recruited and signed by Georgia Tech.

With the Wildcats Finley excelled on both the mound and in the field while setting the school record for home runs in a career with 20 while posting 20 wins on the mound. He was recruited by the Yellow Jackets to be a pitcher.

After seeing his career get off to a slow start due to COVID and Tommy John surgery Finley is showing the Yellow Jackets they got much more than a pitcher.

While Finley is off to a good start on the mound – he is 1-0 with a team leading 1.53 ERA—he is also currently one of the hottest hitters in the Atlantic Coast Conference and he is attracting national attention.

Finley was named the National Player of the Week last week by Collegiate Baseball after he pounded out four home runs with nine RBI while hitting .356 as the team’s designated hitter. His strong four inning start against Georgia in the third game of their series enabled the Jackets to avoid a sweep against his brother Leighton’s Bulldogs.

The 6-foot-4, 222-pound righthander turned in a solid 4.2 innings start against Notre Dame last weekend while hitting his team high seventh home run to lead the Jackets to a 15-2 series clinching win over the Irish. His .452 batting average is also a team high as is his 20 RBI.

“Finley was really good again,” Tech Coach Danny Hall said. “He pitched really well today. He won the series for us and he had a good weekend offensively, too.”

On a pitch count as a result of the Tommy John surgery Finley has left potential wins over Georgia and Notre Dame on the table due to being lifted. He has 11 strikeouts in 17 innings and is limiting opponents to a .197 batting average.

His presence in the daily lineup as a hitter has made him one of the top players in one of the best conferences in college baseball. The ACC currently has eight teams ranked in the top 30 by Collegiate Baseball.

Tech (13-3, 2-1) is ranked No. 27 while Louisville, who the Jackets visit this weekend, is No. 2 behind LSU. Virginia (4), Wake Forest (5), Miami (12), NC State (13), North Carolina (25) and Virginia Tech (29) are the other ranked teams.

His numbers at the plate are good enough to have him ranked in several categories in the ACC including: fifth in batting average, fourth in home runs and first in slugging percentage at 1.071. He is seventh in ERA.