Monday, August 25

TORONTO -- With the Minor League season winding down, we’re due for one last check-in on the Blue Jays’ top prospects before the end of 2025. 

Here are the dates of the final regular season games for each affiliate:

Triple-A Buffalo Bisons: Sept. 21

Double-A New Hampshire Fisher Cats: Sept. 14

High-A Vancouver Canadians: Sept. 7

Single-A Dunedin Blue Jays: Sept. 7

It’s difficult to overstate just how impressive this system has been in 2025, bouncing back from some difficult years with success stories at every level, particularly on the mound. 

Did you enjoy Shane Bieber’s Blue Jays debut on Friday night in Miami? Thank the farm system. Drafting Khal Stephen and developing him into a top arm with a legitimate shot at the Top 100 list allowed the Blue Jays to land Bieber while still having plenty of talent left for other moves and the future. Quantity is always the best approach, and finally, the Blue Jays are nailing it. 

Here’s a look at five prospects to keep in mind entering September:

RHP Trey Yesavage (No. 1)

Yesavage tends to follow a pattern. At each of his four levels, there’s been an early stumble, then he gets his feet set and dominates. After two starts in Triple-A, we’re probably looking at the “dominant” stage again soon. 

It’s all about the big leagues for Yesavage at this point, though, and this still comes back to the simple question of whether Yesavage can be one of the Blue Jays’ 14 best pitchers in September. He’s certainly among the 14 most talented, and with 87 innings across the four levels this season, the Blue Jays have left him with some gas in the tank. That’s not a coincidence. 

Worth monitoring? Yesavage’s fastball averaged just 93 mph on Thursday in Triple-A. Worth getting excited about? His changeup got eight whiffs on 11 swings, which is an absurd number.

LHP Ricky Tiedemann (No. 4)

Once the offseason begins -- and after a few weeks on the couch watching football -- I start to think about which stories I’m most interested in the day Spring Training opens in February. Tiedemann is going to be near the top of that list. 

Don’t forget about Tiedemann. Last year’s surgery and this year’s rehab have cost him two valuable years of development, but he’s still just 23 and still possesses rare talent. If he gets into a game or pitches in the Arizona Fall League this year, that’s enough to call it a “success,” but he’s the ultimate wild card next camp. His upside hasn’t gone anywhere.

3B/SS Juan Sanchez (No. 19)

Signed this year for $997,500 out of the Dominican Republic, Sanchez belongs on the short list of prospects you’ll keep an eye on next year -- if he’s not already there. Yes, Dominican Summer League stats are tough to unpack, but he’s hitting .341 with a 1.004 OPS and the Blue Jays have already been thrilled with the strides he’s taking. He’s still just 17, so we’re talking about a long-term project here, but it’s getting harder to look away from him.

RHP Silvano Hechavarria (No. 26)

The Blue Jays signed the big Cuban right-hander as a 21-year-old in 2024, which already looks like a strong, sneaky move. 

Now 22, Hechavarria has been playing catch-up in a sense given his age, but he’s already risen to High-A Vancouver and given the Canadians two excellent starts. The Blue Jays have already built him up to 76 innings this year, too, so he has a mature workload to match his age. These are the exact types of moves that good organizations make to backload their farm system’s depth. Hechavarria could quickly reach Double-A next year and has the upside of a back-end MLB starter.

C Brandon Valenzuela (NR)

Valenzuela sits just outside of our Top 30, but the move to acquire him from the Padres for Will Wagner was sharp. 

Catchers are like quarterbacks in the NFL. There just aren’t enough of them, and while the era of Alejandro Kirk, Danny Jansen and Gabriel Moreno spoiled the Blue Jays, most teams are stuck in an annual scramble to find a competent backup and rarely do they strike gold like the Blue Jays have with Tyler Heineman. 

Valenzuela is a 24-year-old in Triple-A and a switch hitter, but his headline talent is his defensive game and cannon arm. If he can emerge as Kirk’s backup for the next several years, that’s tremendous value for Toronto.

It’s the happiest we’ve seen manager John Schneider all year, stepping in front of the cameras after Bieber’s debut in Friday’s win over the Marlins. 

“I’ve got Bieber Fever,” he said. “I’m a belieber.”

Sure, the Marlins didn’t roll out an All-Star lineup, but the Blue Jays couldn’t have dreamed of a better debut from their big Trade Deadline addition. This looks like a pitcher worth shaping the rest of your rotation around and a pitcher worthy of starting Game 1 in a postseason series if this keeps rolling. 

If Bieber wins a playoff game in Toronto, which this team hasn’t done since 2016, it immediately becomes one of the best moves this front office has made.

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