One hyped Blue Jays prospect at every minor league level that may disappoint in 2023

Over the years, the Toronto Blue Jays have groomed many great prospects into becoming valuable Major League players. Some, like Alek Manoah, flew through the minor league system way ahead of time to become a main contributor to the ballclub, whereas for others, like Nate Pearson, would take a longer time, encountering many bumps along the road, despite being ranked highly in the system from the start.

Here we take a look at one hyped prospect at each of the Blue Jays’ minor league affiliates that may not progress as fast as one would expect for 2023.

Single-A Dunedin Blue Jays – Adrian Pinto

During the 2021-22 offseason, the Jays had traded Randal Grichuk to the Colorado Rockies for Raimel Tapia and an intriguing prospect in Pinto. He possessed elite skills in hitting, speed, and in the field, despite having a stature of only 5-foot-6. He put that in full display during his Dominican Summer League MVP season in 2021, when he hit .360 with a 1.029 OPS, stealing 41 bases, and walked 38 times compared to only 18 strikeouts.  That placed him already as the 15th highest ranked prospect when he joined the Jays’ system in 2022. The Jays were hoping he could continue to advance his development with their Single-A affiliate Dunedin Blue Jays. 

However, for the 2022 season, Pinto hit only .242, with an OPS of .738, with 18 stolen bases, showing some slight regression compared to his previous output, but he still possessed the valuable tools in his makeup to break out any time. For the start of the 2023 season, he has once again been assigned to start the season in Dunedin, as opposed to promoting him to start in High-A Vancouver. Perhaps they believe he will need a little more seasoning time to develop the various aspects of his game since he is after all only 20 years old. So far after six games, he has hit .278 with a couple RBI and has stolen five bases. Those that were expecting him to fly through the Jays’ minor league system will have the temper their expectations a bit and let this be a growth and developmental year for Pinto.