The Jays travel to Hotlanta to take on a pretty good Braves team. Making matters more difficult, Toronto arguably gets the Braves three best starters, while the bluebirds will run out arguably their three worst (by ERA at least). It's a rematch of the 1992 World Series - let's hope that the winners are once again from the true north strong and free. Advance Scout, activate!

Yesterday we looked at the extended spring training stats for the hitters, today it is the pitchers.  The stat sheet lists 44 pitchers of whom 26 pitched over 20 innings.  That 20 inning limit is what we will use for analysis today.  Most of the pitchers under 20 innings were hurt, are relievers, or players on rehab assignments.  The most innings pitched is 37 by Deivy Estrada.   Norris, Osuna, Musgrove and the other 2011 draftees were mainly in the upper 20's in innings pitched.

Sam and Kelekin gave us great coverage of the draft this week. Today Kelekin wraps it up with his summary and his opinions on the best of the draft. We will also use this thread as the signings thread. Over to Kelekin.........

With the 2012 draft in the rear-view mirror, it’s time we examine some of the players drafted by the Blue Jays and grade the draft. There is no question that this was a top-tier draft by Toronto, taking many high ceiling players in the first three rounds.

Okay, no, they didn't ACTUALLY have six complete games on the farm on Thursday, but six official results went in the books, four of those wins.

The extended spring training season ended yesterday.  Newly drafted players show up for a mini-camp starting this weekend and by the middle of next week the minor league short-season teams will be selected.  The Vancouver Canadians start their season in eight days time.   The short season rosters will change a lot in the early stages as newly signed players show up, get assessed, get into game shape and are assigned to a team.

I have received a copy of the statistics from extended spring training and here are some highlights.

An off day, two suspended games and a loss do not equal an exciting minor league report.

Scott Richmond just didn't have it last night, he gave up seven hits and five runs in the first two innings.  The 51's were put into a hole they couldn't climb out of.  In AA the Richmond Flying Squirrels had two hits off Joel Carreno.  One of them was a solo home run and it put the sad sack Fisher Cats in a hole they couldn't climb out of.  Dunedin rescued the day by winning easily behind Sean Nolin and Gabe Jacobo.  Lansing were off.  Unusually, neither the Las Vegas or the New Hampshire hitters could register an extra base hit.

You can make a decent argument that Clifton Phifer Lee is the best starting pitcher in baseball. Granted, thanks to the intidimidating presence of future first ballot Hall-of-Famer Roy Halladay, it might be easier to argue he's not even the best starting pitcher in his own team's rotation. (And thanks to the continuing emergence of Cole Hamels. may even earn a bronze in the City of Brotherly Shove). But the case can be made for the lithe lefty.

Still, look at his performance last night against the Dodgers -- 7.2 IP, six hits, two runs, one walk, 12 strikeout, seven shoutout frames to begin the game. What's that, it  must be his seventh or eighth win of the year already? Um, not quite ...

The Jays record a nice win tonight, although the defense was not stellar. Big night for Colby Rasmus with a 5-5 night, combined with a bad error. Brett Lawrie hit leadoff and had three hits.

Just wanted to draw your attention to the fact there was some minor league baseball Monday night!  Lansing and Dunedin celebrated "Draft Night" with victories to earn a split for the affiliates.

Sam and Kelekin did a great job yesterday with their draft board.  They didn't get everyone they wanted but getting two of their "wants" in a competitive draft is pretty good.   They are back with their day 2 wish list.  Drafting for day 2 starts at noon today.  Sam and Kelekin will add capsules of some of the drafted players in the comments section as the day progresses.

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Rounds two to fifteen of the 2012 MLB Draft will take place on June 5, 2012.  After what was a solid first day of drafting the Jays will look to day two of the draft to continue to add high upside talent.  In past drafts, teams drafting early on day two would have likely contacted prospects to re-evaluate bonus demands, and in most cases there would have been an early rush on those prospects that had fallen due to signability.  Some teams seem to have set themselves up to perhaps take a run at some of the prospects with bonus demands, but it appears as though most have  blown their bonus allotments on their first pick(s).  I don’t know if I have a great handle on where the Jays sit at the moment.  I think all their picks so far are signable, yet I don’t know if there are any major bargains of the lot.  Davis might get done below slot and maybe Stroman, but Smoral will want some money and both Nay and Gonzales will want to be paid to forgo college commitments to Arizona State and Texas respectively.  In sum, I don’t think you’ll see the Jays going after any of the guys that are considered tough signs. 

 

 

Bauxites sam and Kelekin have stepped in with their predictions for the draft.  Thanks guys.

 

The first year player draft is upon us and what has taken scouts, crosscheckers, the director of amateur scouting, special assistants to the GM, and the GM months and probably years to compile, Kelekin and I have done in a couple days.  In fairness, our draft board is only for the Jays’ first couple picks, while the Jays will be working off a board of hundreds of names all personally scouted by staff several times over.  For example, Jays’ scout Blake Crosby was reported to have seen every one of Aaron Sanchez’s starts in his draft year.  Unfortunately Kelekin and I have not seen these prospects in person, but we have done our youtube research and based a lot of our board off the various scouting reports that circulate on the Internet.  We have tried to provide links to each player on our board so readers can formulate their own opinions.    

The 2012 first year player draft is tomorrow and Toronto picks 17th and 22nd overall. The Jays have five picks in the first 60.

With two games in extras and a doubleheader in High-A, only Lansing played a standard game on Saturday. The affiliates went 2-3 and a top prospect got rocked.

The Blue Jays system is about to get an infusion of talent with the kickoff of the June amateur draft on Monday at 7 p.m. The draft will take place Monday-Wednesday, concluding with the 40th round. The Blue Jays have two first round selections and three picks in the supplemental round. And now on to the current minor leaguers... with the affiliates going 4-1.