Toronto Blue Jays: What do the mocks say?

With the draft coming up early next month and the Blue Jays picking fifth overall, which player do the mock drafts see them landing this year?

The Blue Jays have an exciting opportunity to add to their minor league system next month, as they have the fifth overall selection in the MLB draft. That comes after a 67-95 record that puts them behind only the Tigers, Orioles, Marlins, and Royals.

It’s very hard to say which way Ross Atkins and the Blue Jays front office is leaning right now, and they’re going to have several exciting options to choose from. Since we still have a few weeks to wait, I thought it might be fun to look at some of the more prominent mock drafts that are floating around the internet to see who the Blue Jays could end up with.

I’ll start with the mock done over at MLB.com on Wednesday, and not surprisingly Spencer Torkelson and Austin Martin went one and two. That’s the case with most of the drafts we’ll be looking at, and more often than not Asa Lacy has gone at #3. After that things get a lot more inconsistent though, and at MLB.com, they see the Blue Jays ending up with high school outfielder Zac Veen, taken after the three players previously mentioned, and the Royals selecting Nick Gonzales at number four.

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Rather than analyze what any of these picks mean, I’m just going to look at other drafts to see how various scouts and writers see this year’s draft playing out. To that end, the next mock draft I looked at comes from Baseball America (subscription required) who provided their latest update on May 13th. The same four players were taken ahead of the Blue Jays pick in this draft as well, but this time the Blue Jays went with Emerson Hancock, a college right-hander out of Georgia.

The latest from ESPN comes from May 9th, and they see things going a little differently. On that draft board, Torkelson and Martin stay in the top two, but from there it goes Gonzales at three, and Veen at four, leaving Asa Lacy for the Blue Jays at number five. If Lacy were still available when the Blue Jays’ pick comes up, it wouldn’t be a surprise at all if they took him.

One writer I’ve been following and enjoying lately is Mason Macrae from prospects365.com, so I thought I’d include his list here. He sees a 1-2-3 of Torkelson-Martin-Lacy as well, and Gonzales is back to the Royals at number four. Faced with choosing between Veen and Hancock, this list has the Blue Jays going with the latter.

Last but not least, I thought I’d include the mock draft from cbssports.com, mostly because it’s a little different than the rest. Once again it’s the typical top three, but then Hancock goes at number four to change things up. This one caught my interest because I’m curious what the Blue Jays would do in real life if this scenario comes up. The other player that has been trending in the top five is Nick Gonzales, and while he’s a talented hitter, I’m not sure the Blue Jays need to focus on another middle infielder. According to CBS’ list, they indeed pass on padding that spot further, instead drafting right-hander Max Meyer from Minnesota instead. Meyer is commonly found in the top ten, but this was the highest rating I saw from him on the lists that I looked over.

For what it’s worth, I hope the Blue Jays end up with one of Hancock or Veen, depending on how the picks ahead of them go down. It’ll be years before we know if they made the right choice, but hopefully they can do just that and continue to add to an already exciting young organization.