Future Blue Jays Newsletter

A minor league championship, Tiedemann’s AAA debut, a former Jays farmhand finally reaches the bigs, Arizona Fall League thoughts, an injury update, and some news and notes from around the system in this edition. It’s a bit late, but better that than never….

C’s Win!

They may have stumbled down the stretch, with many of their best players departed for AA, but when the Vancouver Canadians split the first two games of the best-of-fice Northwest League Championship Series at the home of the Mariners’ Everett affiliate, you had to like their chances coming home to venerable Nat Bailey Stadium.

The C’s were 42-23 at the grand old Ontario Street ballpark, and with over 6000 fans in attendance, there’s no atmosphere in the minors quite like it. Adam Macko tossed five shutout innings of one-hit ball to lead Vancouver to a 3-0 win in the first game of the series. Things looked promising for the Canadians to come home needing only one win to clinch the series with rotation revelation Devereaux Harrison, the club’s most consistent starter all season, on the mound for the second contest, but Everett pounded the righthander for 9 runs in two innings en route to a 10-0 whitewash.

With the series returning to British Columbia for the next three games (if necessary), the C’s gave Hunter Gregory the ball for game three. Gregory had his struggles this season, but he turned in his finest effort, tossing four scoreless innings before turning things over to the C’s lockdown bullpen (Vancouver relievers allowed only 3 runs in 21 innings during the series) in a 1-0 shutout.

Ryan Jennings gave the Canadians three shutout innings in game three, an affair that saw Vancouver up 7-0 after only four innings. The C’s cruised the rest of the way, bringing home the franchise’s first NWL title since 2017.

It’s been quite a summer in the Lower Mainland. The team was sold to an American firm in the spring, ending the official joint ownership by local businessmen Jake Kerr and Jeff Mooney, who brought pro ball back to the city 15 years ago. The C’s won the first half of the NWL season with ease, and despite their late season issues, still had the second-best second half record. Attendance was down slightly, but a league-leading average of 4449 fans per game.

I think if it was up to the Blue Jays, they would still prefer a High A affiliate that is closer - getting players and staff back and forth isn’t easy with the paucity of direct flights between Vancouver and Florida. But the C’s are a first-rate operation, and even with the challenges that come with operating a 73 year-old stadium, they’ve done a good job, and new owners Diamond Baseball will have the capital to add on further upgrades to bring The Nat in line with updated MLB standards.

The Long and Winding Road of Jose Espada

Espada was a 5th round pick by Toronto from a deep Puerto Rico pitcher class in 2015. Tall and lean, he was more about projection at that point - this was the next-to-last draft for scouting director Brian Parker, who had been encouraged in the Alex Anthopoulos era to look for the high risk/high reward prospects. Espada was the first PR pithcer drafted that year, and scouts said he was more polished as a pitcher than fellow islander Jose Berrios, drafted by the Twins three years earlier.

Espada did not throw hard (touching 92), but there was reason the believe he’d add more velo as he matured. Assigned to then-rookie ball in his draft year, Espada showed enough promise to be ranked as the 16th-best prospect in the system.

That was to be as high as Espada got.

Sent to then-short season in Vancouver, he was part of the 2017 league champs, but repeated the level the next season. Injuries cut short his 2019 campaign to 7.2 innings at Low A Lansing, and at the end of the season, the Blue Jays placed him on waivers, which is something of an unusual minor league move. Likely, the Blue Jays wanted to send a message to Espada, who was viewed as “soft” by some of the coaching staff. The Red Sox scooped up Espada off those waivers in December; his odyssey was only beginning at that point.

Like all other minor leaguers, Espada missed the entirety of the 2020 season. He pitched mostly in relief for Boston’s High A affiliate in 2021, then elected minor league free agency at the end of the season. Finding no takers in affiliated ball, Espada pitched half a season in indy ball before being signed by the Padres mid 2022, for whom he made his MLB debut last week.

Espada fanned 110 in 83 innings spent mostly at AA this season. Perhaps this is a story about a guy who always had a talented arm, but didn’t know how to make the most of it for the longest time.

AFL Rosters

While Tiedemann was absolutely a lock to be on this roster after missing two months of the season with a biceps strain, it seems like the Arizona Fall League, which was once a finishing school of sorts for elite upper level prospects has turned more into a place where promising players can get extra reps.

Van Eyk, once a promising 2020 2nd rounder, missed all of last season recovering from Tommy John surgery, and was started up and shut down three different times this season before finishing the season in AA. He’s a reminder that recovery from TJ is not always a smooth process. Similarly, Stadler - a large (6’9”), hard-throwing individual - missed all of 2022 and the first six weeks of this season. Palmer had a breakout 2022, but needed TJ surgery last September, and threw only a handful of innings this year.

No position player in the system has made as much progress over the past two seasons as Palmegiani. There is no doubt about the bat - it will be interesting to see how many reps he gets at 3rd. There is no doubt about Brown’s tools, but he took something of a step back this season. In April, he told me that he hoped to play winter ball this year, but this will be the next best thing. It will also be a huge challenge for the Oakville native, who is Rule 5 eligible this fall.

Former big leaguer Austin Bibens-Dirkx, who served as Vancouver’s bullpen coach this season, joins the Seguaros’ staff, with C’s trainer Roelvis Vargas joining him.

Tiedemann’s AAA debut

Speaking of Ricky, he made his first and last AAA start of the season against a very tough Orioles Norfolk team last month. All things considered, while he might not have been dominant, he was very good, striking out 6 and surrendering an unearned run in 4 innings of work.

Tiedemann’s velo was down slightly as the game progressed. His fastball command was not sharp up in the zone. Maybe the more experienced Triple A hitters were not tempted to chase, but he didn’t seem to be getting many whiffs at the top (or beyond) of the strike zone. His slider was very much on the money, by contrast.

But one had to be impressed with how Tiedemann handled uber prospect Jackson Holliday, BA’s Minor League Player of the Year. Tiedemann got the much-heralded prospect to weakly ground to start the game, then got him on a corkscrew sweeper second time around:

While we’re on the topic of that game, Addison Barger made a fine defensive play in right field, and it’s looking more and more like that’s the position he may ultimately wind up at - with the return of Otto Lopez and the promotion of Leo Jimenez, granted, the middle of the Bisons infield was crowded down the stretch - the majority of his starts in September were in Right. Barger certainly has the arm strength, hands, and quick-twitch reflexes for the position.

Notes from Around the System

-Dahian Santos’ season ended in early July, but the mystery sounding his placement on the IL was just beginning.

The slight RHP with the wipeout slider didn’t see an innings increase at the beginning of June, when most other starters in the system were getting stretched out. He scuffled for most of the month, but then after pitching five innings on Canada Day, he was put on the 7-day list a week later.

Inquiries to the Blue Jays didn’t reveal the specifics of Santos’ injury (they seldom do), but the responses I got were more vague than usual. Keegan Matheson, Blue Jays beat reporter for MLB, did some digging as well, and was told that it was likely tendinitis, and the farm department feels they caught in time before the injury became more serious. All indications are that he’s working hard on his rehab, and that he should be ready to go in the spring.

A cynic might suggest that with Santos Rule 5 eligible, and his SL/FB mix an ideal combination for a big league bullpen, perhaps the Blue Jays wanted to keep him under wraps anyway.

-MiLB.com released its All Stars for each minor league (the AAA list doesn’t appear to have been released). SS Leo Jimenez, who finished the year with Buffalo, was named to the Eastern League team. 2B Michael Turconi, who finished at AA, was named to the Northwest League squad, while reliever Matt Svanson, dealt at the deadline to the Cards, made the team as well. To these eyes, Turconi was Vancouver’s best player by a considerable margin.

-Orelvis Martinez’ OBP by month, in case you were wondering:

April .159

May .358

June .391

July .520

August .350

September ..340

-some more Buffalo stuff: Rafael Lantigua’s 98 walks were second in the International League; so were his 40 doubles. Lantigua’s .425 OBP was good enough for 4th, and he stole 28 bases as well. With his defensive versatility, there’s a good chance he doesn’t go unclaimed in this year’s Rule 5. Spencer Horwitz’ .450 OBP led the IL, while his .945 OPS was second.

-as I tweeted yesterday, the Surprise Seguaros, for whom the Blue Jays contingent will play for, doesn’t appear to stream their “home” games, so prospect hunters will have less of a prospect buffet to choose from.