A look back at 4 Blue Jays prospects who got away

Over the years, the Toronto Blue Jays have drafted many prospects, some of which turned out to be important difference makers for the club, while others that just fizzled out. Among them, there have been a select few that may have been initially drafted by the Jays, but they eventually went on to stardom with another team.

Here, we take a look back at four prospects that the Jays drafted within the past 15 years that eventually got away. Perhaps they were traded away before they became a star, perhaps they were selected but didn't end up coming to an agreement with the Jays. Let's jump in and take a painful look back.

Joe Musgrove

Right-handed pitcherJoe Musgrove was taken by the Jays in the first round back in the 2011 MLB Draft. After spending a little over a year at the Rookie minor league level in the organization, he became part of a massive 10-player trade between the Jays and Houston Astros in 2012. The blockbuster brought notables J.A. Happ and Brandon Lyon to Toronto, while Musgrove joined Francisco Cordero and company going the other way to Houston.

For the most part, Musgrove was just a solid back end of the rotation starter for the Astros and later for the Pittsburgh Pirates between 2016-2020. During those years, he would sport an ERA constantly around four while striking out close to one batter per inning. It was not until he joined the San Diego Padres through a three-team trade during the 2020-21 offseason that his career finally took off.

In four seasons with the Padres, Musgrove has compiled a 37-24 record with a stellar 3.21 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, along with 579 strikeouts in 553 innings pitched over 96 starts. In terms of his overall accomplishments, he was an All-Star back during the 2022 season, a no-hit artist back in 2021, as well as a World Series winner with the Astros back in 2017 as a reliever at the time. Had the Jays had the services of Musgrove the past few seasons, who knows how much further they could have progressed during their short playoff runs. But one thing is for sure, they wouldn’t need to be scratching for more pitching depth all this time as he would have been a main staple in their rotation.