Royals prospect and KC-area prep product Carter Jensen named Carolina League All-Star

Former Park Hill High School standout and Kansas City Royals third-round draft pick in 2021 Carter Jensen earned Carolina League All-Star honors in his first full season playing Minor League Baseball.

Jensen, a catcher, earned the Columbia Fireflies Player of the Year award this season. The native of Kansas City, Missouri, turned 19 in July.

The managers of the respective Carolina League teams voted on the All-Star team, which Minor League Baseball announced on Thursday.

Jensen played in just 19 games in the Arizona Complex last year after the Royals selected him 78th overall in the MLB Draft.

This season, the 6-foot-1, 210-pound Jensen played in 113 games for Low-A Columbia and slashed .226/.363/.382 with 11 home runs, 24 doubles, two triples, 50 RBIs, 66 runs scored, 83 walks and eight stolen bases.

In 22 games in August, Jensen batted .333 with nine RBIs, 24 walks and 11 extra-base hits.

He ranked third in the league in walks and seventh in doubles. He also became the first player 18 or younger at the start of the season with at least 10 home runs and at least 80 walks in a single season in the minors since 2006 (when data is available), according to the website FanGraphs.com.

Baseball America ranks Jensen as the 19th-best prospect in the Royals’ farm system, and MLBPipeline.com ranks him 13th in the same category.