Thanks Gerry and all who contributed.

As much as I think Otto Lopez has more to offer than he showed in 2023, Cam Eden has better defense and 3 options vs 0 options... although Eden's upside with the bat might be Bradley Zimmer.

As bpoz said - thanks to all the minor league writers. I enjoy reading these summaries, but have never done one myself. Summertime I tend to be running around full speed (single parenthood is exhausting) so have little time to do much here beyond a few comments, a post now and then, but committing to a regular column? Nope. In a month or so I'll probably be up to digging into the numbers a bit and do something about it just for fun (maybe a comparison of some of our top prospects to past top ones at the same age or something... dancing in my mind now).

Final standings...

• AAA: Bisons 34-41 first half (14 1/2 out, 8 of 10), 42-31 second half (5 out, 3rd of 10), overall 76-72 5th place 13 1/2 out.
• AA: New Hampshire 35-33 1st half (7 out, 3 of 6), 27-39 2nd half (13 1/2 out, 6 of 6, 12 of 12 in the league, ouch), 62-72 overall 20 1/2 out 4th of 6.
• A+: Vancouver 38-27 1st half (1st place), 39-27 2nd half (1 out, 2 of 6), overall 77-54, 1st place, won championship in playoffs.
• A: Dunedin 32-34 1st half (12 1/2 back, 4 of 6), 30-36 2nd half (14 back, 6 of 6, 7 of 10 in league, the other division sucked hard), 62-70 overall, 18 1/2 out 5 of 6.
• Rookie: Florida Complex: 17-37 15 1/2 out 4 of 4, 15 of 15 in league (ouch)
• Forgien: Dominican Summer League: 28-25 8 1/2 out, 5 of 8. What is odd is many others have 2 teams, but the Jays just one (I recall the Jays having 2 in the past at times).

So the overall system record was 322-330, equivalent to an 80-82 record over 162 games with 1 title from 6 teams. Not bad, but not great either. Ideally someone other than Vancouver would've also made the playoffs. But not a disaster. Well, the FCL was ugly (just ask Manoah with his 37.13 ERA there) as was New Hampshire's 2nd half (price of so many doing well in the first half, they were gone for the 2nd).

With organization minor league rosters shrinking to 165 from 180 and DSL rosters exempt from the 165, might be time for a second DSL team

There are 50 DSL teams. 20 major league orgs have two teams each. Ten orgs, including the Jays, have just one.

Thanks to all the contributors for another excellent year of coverage:)

It does seem odd the Jays only have 1 given they used to be very active in international free agency and have had some great luck there - Vlad, Kirk, and Moreno being 3 obvious recent examples. Maybe they find little value in a second team.

Easy enough to check a bit...

• 2018: 1 team, future ML'ers: none so far
• 2017: 1 team, future ML'ers: Gabriel Moreno
• 2016: 1 team, future ML'ers: Max Castillo, Dany Jiménez
• 2015: 1 team, future ML'ers: Yennsy Díaz, Dany Jiménez
• 2014: 1 team, future ML'ers: Edward Olivares
• 2013: 1 team, future ML'ers: Richard Urena, Miguel Castro, Angel Perdomo
• 2012: 1 team, future ML'ers: Miguel Castro, Jimmy Cordero, José Fernández, Angel Perdomo, Jesus Tinoco (lots of pitchers that year)
• 2011: 1 team, future ML'ers: Jairo Labourt
• 2010: 1 team, future ML'ers: none

In 1992 & 1993 the Jays had 2 teams, in '92 the one went nuts with a 68-2 record but I cannot find a full list of who played on that team, 3 known future ML'ers from it though are Carlos Almanzar, Edwin Hurtado and Dilson Torres. Nutty how they went 68-2 but lost in the first round of the playoffs.

Bottom line to me: having 2 teams might seem like a good idea, but 1 should do the trick as the Jays rarely have more than 1 or 2 graduate from there to reach the majors. I figure 2019-now would have few who have reached the US minors, let alone the majors.

A big thank you and thumbs up to all the contributors to the minor league reports.

Thanks John N for the breakdown. Took me a while to understand what you were doing. 1) 2018 going backwards to 2010. 2) Kirk & Osuna are Mexican so maybe they did not play in the DSL. 3) Vlad signed July 2, 2015 and did not play in DSL. He started in the Appy league in 2016. Zulueta was old and maybe injured and covid wiped out 2020. These are just guesses.

The signings I suspect don't follow rules. I believe players are recruited at age 14 and play for a trainer that receives financial compensation. Then the player is signed when he qualifies. I believe this because prior to signing, maybe as much as a year earlier, a list of top Int'l prospects is published with a ML team referred to as the most likely signee. The accuracy is incredible unlike the draft where all kinds of surprises happen.

Maybe the Jays will go to 2 teams but I suspect not. I suspect that they do a lot of intra squad games and in house training.

Thanks for all the coverage this year. The first month or two was probably the worst system performance in my lifetime but things look a lot better now with some ready to help guys close to the majors and some big potential lower down.

If I remember right, the first month or two of 2004 was a disaster for the minor league system too.  Aaron Hill (a top prospect) was in New Hampshire, and there seemed to be a lot of weather postponements there and he got off to a slow start.  Alex Rios was in Syracuse and struggled.  Guillermo Quiroz had had that injury at the end of 2003.  There was hope of a complete recovery (he was BA's #35 prospect in baseball before the 2004 season), but it did not happen and he too struggled.  The Season from Hell extended well beyond the major league club. 

tentative season-end Top-10

* 1. Tiedemann
* 2. Martinez
* 3. Nimmala
* 4. Barriera
* 5. Schneider

* T-6. Barger
* T-6. Horwitz
* T-6. Jimenez
* T-6. Roden
* T-6. Bohrofen

* HM: DeJesus, Palmegiani

My rought top-10
1-Tiedemann
2-Orelvis
3-Nimmala
4-Schneider
5-Roden
6-Barriera
7-Jimenez
8-Barger
9-Bohrofen
10-Macko/Palmegiani/DeJesus/Bonilla

Have to hear scouting reports too to see how people look. Big drops between 1/2/3/4 for me.

My top 5:

1. Schneider
2. Tiedemann
3. Roden
4. Nimmala
5. Martinez

Schneider over Tiedemann will be a minority opinion, but my reasoning is found below.

Tiedemann has a 10-15% chance of being Chris Sale or Barry Zito, and generating 3 really great years before free agency. He also has a 20-30% chance of having his career totally derailed by injury.

Schneider has a 15-20% chance of being an All-Star and about an equal chance of having his career flame out due to swing and miss. Subjectively I am lot more comfortable with Schneider avoiding the downside than Tiedemann.

Ranking the Jays system is extraordinarily challenging this year (in my view). All of the potential top prospects (with one exception) come with something that makes assessing the range of future outcomes more challenging than usual. Tiedemann has barely pitched; Schneider has an extraordinarily weird (and potentially outcome distorting) and small set of MLB data; Martinez was close to being a non prospect as recently as May 1; Nimmala was just drafted. In saying all of the above, I'm not really referring to risk of outcomes (all prospects have that) but just difficulty in assessment. Roden is the closest to having a "normal" body of evidence from which to make a range of outcomes assessment. I don't know where I come out yet on all of that but I do worry that Schneider's first 100 ABs positively and abnormally distorts his place on these lists and I always worry about small sample sizes distorting our priors (and I say that as a big Schneider fan).

sounds like a cop out to me, Nigel!

In answer to Nigel re Schneider. His MLB performance offensively only changes things modestly. What has changed things considerably for me is watching him play defence at second base. I think he's an average defensive second baseman. I had no idea about that until I saw him

The other thing is the X factor. His self-discipline is impressive and bodes well for his development. He's getting the short end of the stick from the umpires and has maintained composure and rarely chased.

Nigel made some very good points IMO because his reasoning agrees with mine.

With 111 ABs Schneider is still a prospect. Since he helped the jays with a very hot start he deserves a good ranking. My #7 pick. These lists are fun but very often are not right.

Nimmila & Barriera have not done enough to be in my top 10. Juenger from 2021 #22, #7 and now #14. This is just my philosophy.

Sounds like a cop out, bpoz!!

Agreed about schneider's defense tho. And horwitz in the same boat. Them being quality fielders raises their floors quite a bit.

Yes.  Horwitz is a solid fielder at first base.  Still, he's going to be 26 in November and being 14 months older and lower down the defensive spectrum makes him a much riskier bet.  He needs to hit quite a bit at first base to have any significant value.  Which I think everybody would agree with. 

Well if you're going to call me a chicken:)....

Tiedemann
Nimmala
Roden
Martinez
Jimenez
Schneider

I was going to say that it might be the sign of a bad system that you have to choose between extreme of high upside/high risk and low upside/low risk but I think that's a bit harsh.

I think guys like Tiedemann and Schneider are both legitimately exciting, if complete opposites on the risk/upside scale.

It's looking better today than on May 15 but I don't think its a good system. Its a system with a wider than normal range of reasonable outcomes and that isn't all bad by any means.

I agree. It's not a very good system, but it has looked somewhat better asvthe year went on.

So I tried to figure out what a realistic upside for Schneider is. I did a Stathead search, using second baseman seasons with 600+ PA, 125

Ack, geeklog issue. The Stathead search was for OPS+ between 125 and 135, and less than 1 dWAR. The #1 hit was Brian Dozier who had two 5 WAR seasons. That's Schneider's realistic upside.

Dozier as an upside feels right. I think Schneider's most likely outcome will be a RH Cavan Biggio, with slightly more power and slightly less base running and defence (I'm lower on his D at 2B than others). In other words, I think he can be a slightly above average bat built on patience and mid range power and below average, but not terrible, defence at multiple positions. That would be a decent outcome given where Schneider was on the prospect pile 3 months ago and a decent player to have around at league minimum.

As for the current top-10 prospects, my take goes like this:

1     Ricky Tiedemann
2     Orelvis Martinez
3     Arjun Nimmala
4     Alan Roden
5     Brandon Barriera
6     Addison Barger
7     Enmanuel Bonilla
8     Leonardo Jimenez
9     Adam Macko
10     Tucker Toman

If Davis Schneider still qualified I'd put him at #4.

Very good A & B groups Jonny German. Pearson has had a good year in the majors. Healthy and gained confidence. If healthy he should be even better next year.

I dunno Jonny - schneider is younger and has a significantly better milb profile than any of the others you mentioned.

I agree with Nigel that the Jays rankings are very difficult with few clear cut standouts...

My order would probably be:
Ricky Tiedemann
Orelvis Martinez
Davis Schneider
Kendry Rojas
Addison Barger
Alan Roden
Arjun Nimmala
Damiano Palmegiani
Leo Jimenez
Brandon Barriera

19-year-old Fernando Perez (BA’s #13 FCL prospect) seems like someone who could crack the top 10 in a year or so.

I look at the Yankees system in comparison and things don't seem too bad.

Yeah, the Jays have guys who have been in the minors a long time but take King for example.
He'll be 29 next year and hits free agency at the end of the next year.

They probably have a bunch of rule 5 candidates that they won't protect, but overall, they have  more Florial types than true high octane prospects.

Against the NYY the Jays' system doesn't look that bleak - against Bal, TB and Boston its a very different story.

Didn't realise this until now, but a lot of prospects recently shrank, a few 4 inches. Most of the Jays kids only an inch, but Orelvis and Toman went from 6'1" to 5'11", Tanner Morris 6'2" to 5'11" and Gabby Martinez from 6' to 5'9".

That's interesting hypobole. I'm not surprised at the shrinkage - I am surprised by the acknowledgement of it. I used to laugh at the posted heights on many of the Jays' prospects. In years past I sometimes sat in the box seats right next to the C's on deck circle at the Nat and having several C's players standing together, practically an arm's reach away, gives you an idea of where these things might be off. The most obvious example that I remember was Logan Warmoth. He was nowhere near his listed height or weight. Fun and games:)

Part of the acknowledgement is the ABS system. MLB needed accurate heights for the robo-umps. Also found out that part of the system many teams use for trades has a height input.

Some teams purposely made their players taller to make them a bit more attractive.

That’s interesting. It’s also the kind of thing that catches up to you, quickly, no?

I would assume teams would take those measurements as part of the physicals / “onboarding” process. Maybe some don’t?

Thanks hypobole about the height shrink. I too wondered about that. This off season I will waste time looking at that.

And here's some Ricky T stuff

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/what-kyle-harrison-can-teach-us-about-ricky-tiedemann/

There is a very interesting article at Fangraphs about player heights. It seems MLB asked for updated heights for the automated strike zone system. The article suggests the new heights could be because of the re-measure or it could be that players were looking to be listed at a lower height to try and shrink their strike zone.

Jesse Sanchez has a list of top 50 Int'l prospects. Usually they say "tied to team X" but not this time. Anyone know who is tied to the Jays?

#8 SS Kennew Blanco

99% sure #34 Andres Arias is the Junior Arias the internet had signing with the Jays last Jan 15

Thanks Mendocino. Kennew Blanco is from Venezuela. Andres Arias from DR so different trainers. I believe that it is not a free market. Every team signs younger players that are 14 years old. The trainers run the program for their affiliated ML team in the complex provided.

Now I have to check out Jose Luis Montero in the Venezuela and Jaime Ramos in the DR. They are probably our trainers.

Cam Eden was signed as a SS. I remember him playing 2B early in his career. So versatility is something he has.

I'll throw a RIP Tim Wakefield in here.

I always enjoyed watching him pitch.

Trent Palmer is no longer listed on the Jays' Arizona Fall League roster.

Thanks Marc. I am following the AFL.

The roster seems to be Connor Larkin, Fitz Stadler, Tiedemann and Van Eyk. Palmegiani, Dasan Brown and Will Robertson. I was hoping Troy Watson was on the roster.

Nice AFL debut for Palmegiani - 5 PA's, 2 singles, a double and a walk.

Ricky T scheduled to start for the Saguaros tonight.