Forget Hechavarria, Jays Sitting Purdy

Not a lot to talk about today. Jays game was rained out, leaving us with call-in segments with Jerry Howarth and Alan Ashby that were otherwise un-noteworthy other than hearing Howarth on multiple occasions praise organizations who bring in top sabermetricians to their front office. Nonetheless, Bob Elliott's twitter page has alerted us to the fact that Jays Canadian scout Jamie Lehman has completed his first signing - Grafton, Ontario's Nick Purdy.

So what do we know about Purdy? Well, he was drafted in the 2008 Amateur Draft in the 36th round by the Kansas City Royals, 1,075th overall. So what we can safely assume is that he is among the best 1,100 20 year old baseball players in North America. Before that he went in the 50th round to the Mariners in 2007. So at the very least he's been moving up the draft board. However he did warrant 3 minutes of video on the 2008 MLB draft page, so if you want to you can check that out here.

Perfect Game USA has a number of scouting reports available on Purdy, and they're all particularly encouraging. One scout clocked his fastball velocity in at 94mph with a "good" 75mph curve and a "solid" change. He described the kid as a "top level pitching prospect" who has solid bat speed and power as a hitter. Another scout clocked his fastball at 90mph but compact arm action and easy delivery, labeling him a "highest level prospect".

Those reports were from before he was drafted in 2008, and he ended up not signing with the Royals. He went undrafted in 2009, and although Canadian Baseball Network listed him among the Canadians in College 2009 at Hillsborough Community College in Florida, he is no longer listed on their roster. At 19 this past summer he played for Oshawa Dodgers of the Intercounty League, struggling with his control over 6 innings of work walking 6 while striking out 7 and posting an ERA of 6.00. He did however spend most of his time at third, appearing in 17 games and posting a less than staggering .245/.327/.367 with 2 home runs.

His stats are less than impressive over this stretch, but we are talking about a 19 year old kid getting infrequent stretches of work against much older competition. The simple fact is that in 2008, scouts considered this kid a potential impact pitcher. For whatever reason he's never been able to get a big league contract, but in terms of low-risk high reward moves this pretty much takes the cake. Clearly the Blue Jays and Jamie Lehman felt the same way.