Blue Jays organizational preview

[TestSubjekt]

The future success of every Major League team lies in its Minor League system. With that in mind, each preseason, MLB.com takes a top-to-bottom look at all 30 organizations, from top prospects to recent draft picks.

http://www.minorleaguebaseball.com/n...milb&fext=.jsp

It's amazing how outside-the-box thinking can become a mainstream philosophy. Then, when one of the largest proponents of that initially seemingly radical thinking goes back to an "old school" idea, it sends shock waves through the industry.

Case in point, the Toronto Blue Jays. In five drafts since J.P. Ricciardi became the team's general manager, there has been a huge focus on drafting college players, aka "the Moneyball approach." The first player taken in each of the five drafts prior to 2006 was from the college ranks, and the Jays' overall drafting were always extremely university heavy.

Then came last year when, to many people's surprise, they took high school bat Travis Snider with their first pick, No. 14 overall. Was this a shift in philosophy? Would the Blue Jays, like the godfather of Moneyball, the A's, stray from the college approach and start taking young prepsters? Not exactly. The Jays still took 32 of their 48 picks from colleges, with eight more coming from the junior college ranks. But needing to add an impact bat in a system that hasn't produced many, they took who they thought was the best offensive player on the board, even though Snider was just 18.

Watching how quickly Snider can develop will be one of the more interesting stories in the Jays' system. It's not too outrageous for Toronto fans to envision Snider playing alongside Adam Lind, the one true impact bat at the upper levels, in the near future. Lind should make a contribution in Toronto this year after setting the world on fire in 2006. On the pitching front, some of the recently-drafted college pitchers are close, but none are aces in the making.

The Blue Jays didn't have a pick until the fourth round after Snider because they've been playing the free agent market to improve the big league club. They did use some of the money they saved from not having early picks to sign an intriguing Venezuelan teenager, and to hand out larger bonuses to later-round picks who seemed tough to sign. That should bolster a system that hasn't moved guys to the big leagues as quickly as hoped and might help the Jays once again rely more on their homegrown players than being forced to play the big league market.

CONTINUE...>>>