Toronto Blue Jays top 10 prospects for 2018
We have reached the point of the offseason where prospect lists abound. We continue our top 10 prospects for every team with the Toronto Blue Jays!
Our team top 10 prospect lists at Call to the Pen are spearheaded by Benjamin Chase. Today, he gives us the top ten prospects for the Toronto Blue Jays.
This season, we will be going through teams by division, in order of 2017 record. The AL East will be first, followed by the AL Central and AL West. Then the focus will shift to the National League in the same order.
The format will be as it was last season for the same lists, with a system review, which will include last season’s list. The top 10 will follow in reverse order, two players per page in order to give adequate space to each player. Major trades or international signings will lead to an updated top 10!
Finally, don’t go away after #1 is revealed as each list will also contain a player either signed in the 2017 international free agent class or drafted in 2017 that isn’t part of the top 10 and should be tracked. Last season’s mentions in that area made over half of the top 10s this season, so this is a great way to get to know a player who could be making a big splash in the organization.
System overview
The Blue Jays as a team are in a peculiar spot. The team has some quality veterans in Troy Tulowitzki, Josh Donaldson, Marcus Stroman, Kevin Pillar, and Russell Martin. However, the depth of their team is lacking, and their farm system is not incredibly stacked in the upper minors.
A few seasons back, the New York Yankees were in a similar position and leveraged intelligent work in the draft and foreign markets along with quality trades of their veterans when the opportunities presented themselves to help not only build up one of the best farm systems in the game, but also get the major league club quickly back into contention.
The Blue Jays seem to be in a position to do something similar. The arms heralded in the system coming into 2017 seemed to all have a poor year, the top middle infielder in the system took a big step back, and arguably the power hitter closest to the majors also struggled.
However, the team should have two of the top 10-20 prospects in all of the game as lists come out this offseason, and there are some very high upside options lower in the system that could leap forward quickly.
While the Blue Jays system is not a top 5 system currently, if the team were to commit to a re-tool, they could very quickly get to that point.
Let’s take a look at that system….
Next: #9 and #10