LOS ANGELES – The wait until No. 23 was excruciating for Brandon Barriera, and not just because he was rocking a dark suit on a 34 C afternoon that was scorching even in the shade at the LA LIVE entertainment complex.
Uncertainty about the future isn’t easy, and the 18-year-old left-hander was eager to find out where he was going. He didn’t expect it to take more than two hours for his name to be called. Little did he know that the Toronto Blue Jays were actually chasing him up to two picks before it was their turn.
Emotions ran high after it became official. He hugged his family. He broke down on television during his first interview since the selection and then vowed to make the other 22 teams regret passing on him.
What a ride.
“I’m going to stick with it until I make my big league debut, and even then it makes this game a lot easier now,” Barriera said in an interview. “I’m actually thankful for all these teams that passed on me because I’m going to use that and work to get better and be the best player that I can be.”
That combination of confidence and competitiveness made quite the first impression, and combined with his athleticism, mid-90s fastball, plus slider, changeup and breaking ball, helped attract the Blue Jays.
His skill set checks a lot of the boxes they look for in pitchers, even if “there’s more risk when you’re drafting a high school pitcher in this area,” said director of amateur scouting Shane Farrell. “Someone like Brandon, with his mix, we’re excited about the quality of things he’s going to bring to the field.”
Picking in the bottom third of the opening round left the Blue Jays unable to focus on a few players, instead building a pool of options they thought would be available in that range. One big surprise early in the draft — the Texas Rangers taking right-hander Kumar Rocker at No. 3 — had a trickle-down effect that led to several other changes.
As the machinations unfolded, Barriera waited and waited — “it’s not a great feeling just sitting there,” he said — and once his name was called, there was “a lot of relief on my shoulders. That was the hard part. Now comes the easy part. I have to go play baseball.
The Blue Jays were an unexpected landing spot, but also a welcome one.
Barriera, identified by local scout Adrian Casanova, is committed to Vanderbilt, but the estimated value of the No. 23 pick is $3,075,300. In the second round, at No. 60 overall, they took shortstop Josh Kasevich from Oregon, at No. 77 they selected infielder Tucker Toman from Hammond High School in Columbia, South Carolina, before taking Cade Doughty, a second baseman from Louisiana State, one pick later.
The Blue Jays will have a total signing bonus of $8,367,700 to work with, boosted by nearly $1.7 million from the 77-78 compensatory picks for the departures of Marcus Semien and Robbie Ray.
“We feel like we’re in a good spot,” Farrell said of signing the four picks. “We don’t foresee much difficulty in doing things as they are now.”
All infielders were projected to go higher than in the third-party rankings, and the Blue Jays had to “manage our bonus allocation in a way that allows us to acquire two hitters that we believe in and some upside in acquiring two high-school players today, too,” Farrell said.
Kasevich, selected by local scout Ryan Fox, is a high-contact, high-walk, low-hitting hitter with a chance to stick up the middle.
Toman, drafted by Mike Tidyk, is the big swing here, someone Baseball America describes as “one of the most successful/powerful high school players in the class” but also a “gentle defender.”
Doughty, scouted by Chris Curtis, has shown increased power this season, driving balls into gaps “at higher exit velocities than previously seen,” according to Baseball America.
“We’ve acquired three different types of forwards,” Farrell said. “Josh, very contact oriented. We think Tucker has some power potential and Cade is just a good hitter in his own right. We are excited about all three.”
Barriera was born in New York and grew up a Yankees fan mesmerized by lefty Andy Pettitte, but moved to Florida when he was nine. At age 11, he joined the Cannons baseball academy, where director Nick James worked with him on his pitching and coached him on the travel top.
Their relationship is such that he was with Barriera and his family on the project and praised the man as much as the “good things.”
“Most of this year he was 94-97, up to 99 a few times. A slider with real power. We had over 3000 rpm quite a few times this spring during practice. Good breaking ball, 11-5 shape at that. His best shot might be his changeup,” James said. “But what people will find out about loving Brandon in Toronto is what a great teammate he is. Wherever he’s been, he’s a team-first guy, he’s a program-first guy, wants to do whatever it takes to win and celebrates his teammates just as much as he enjoys your own success.”
That way, he’ll fit right in with the culture the Blue Jays are trying to maintain, with a chance to augment the cadre of young guns the team has in double-A New Hampshire and single-A Vancouver.
Like Ricky Tiedemann, who has emerged as the club’s top prospect, Barriera is comfortable throwing any of his pitches at any time, with a “bulldog on offense” mindset on the mound.
“I’m not going to take anything down just because you’re the hitter on the ninth hole or if you’re 0-for-3 with three shots — I’m still going to hit you the same way,” he said. “At the end of the day, somehow I want to make the hitters look stupid. That’s pretty much my mentality out there.”
While Barriera focused on Pettitte when he was young, in recent years he has focused more on Luis Severino, the electric right-hander who “isn’t the biggest guy on the field, but he plays hard, his stuff plays hard and he goes out there with a lot emotion and playing with a lot of energy.”
That admiration for Severino and the Yankees will have to change, something he wore while wearing a crisp new white Blue Jays jersey over his suit and a blue hat on his head.
“Oh yeah,” Barriera said. “I’m 100 percent Blue Jays now.”
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