The Situation: Bo Bichette has struggled and is now hurt (or perhaps struggled while hurt). But in any case he has hit the injured list, to be replaced by the Jays top hitting prospect, Orelvis Martinez.
The Background: Martinez was a seven-figure-bonus signing from the Jays 2018 IFA class. He was immediately brought stateside in 2019, and slugged nearly .550 as a 17-year-old in the GCL. We got commensurate strong live reports, but back then did tend to be fairly conservative with complex-level bats. He ranked eighth in a deep Jays system that year as we awaited a 2020 full-season ball assignment. That of course had to wait until 2021, although we got strong reports on Martinez during his instructs time at the end of 2020. The now 19-year-old Martinez slugged .549 once again, this time split between two A-ball levels. He did struggle a bit after his promotion to the Northwest League, and overall looked more like a future third baseman than shortstop. But the power looked extremely real, so he checked in at third on the Jays list and no. 62 on the Top 101. Martinez’s transition to the upper minors was bumpy. As one of the youngest players in the Eastern League in 2022, he did swat 30 home runs, but saw his strikeout rate balloon and his OBP dip under .300. So his prospect stock dropped a bit as well. He got some 101 consideration but ended up just off, and fell to number five on Toronto’s team list. His second pass at Double-A went a bit better—although he spent most of the season getting reps at infield spots other than shortstop—and was even better after his promotion to Buffalo. He popped back onto the Top 101, as he was close to the majors and this kind of power from a player still in their early 20s is unusual. Martinez has more or less xeroxed his 2023 International League line so far in 2024, and after logging over 300 games in the upper minors, is clearly ready for a major league stress test.
The Scouting Report: Martinez has been a notable prospect for over half a decade, so perhaps a bit of fatigue has set in. And he does have some fairly obvious flaws, but he’s also near the top of the Triple-A leaderboards in some important power markers (90th percentile exit velocity and damage rate to name two). And when you look at those categories—and SEAGER where he’s also in the top 20—you’ll find him surrounded mostly by older prospects with major-league time under their belts (and also literally Junior Caminero). Okay, but what about those flaws? Well, to get to that power, Martinez has a big old stomp and lift swing, taking pretty long rips through the zone. He’s hitting the ball even harder this year—not surprising given Baseball America’s research on exit velocities relative to age—but he can sometimes struggle to consistently pull the ball or adjust to offspeed stuff. Martinez’s power will play line-to-line, and he’s aggressive in the zone without being that much of a free swinger outside of it, but the contact profile runs a bit of a knife’s edge, and the jump from Triple-A to the majors may be as large as it’s ever been. If he can hit .240, he’s a good regular, but any less than that you end up in the Patrick Wisdom/Jack Suwinski/Jo Adell range. Martinez should have a bit more defensive value than that group though. He’s playing second and third exclusively now, and he might see time at both spots in the majors, and should be at least average at either with the glove.
Immediate Major-League Future: Martinez is a bat-first profile, and power-over-hit at that, so you don’t know for sure how he’s going to fare against major league spin until he sees it. It’s not entirely surprising he’s sitting against Tanner Houck tonight—he probably just got off a plane and that sweeper is hellacious even if you’ve seen pitches like it before. Bichette’s calf issue might only require a short-term IL stint, and the balance of the Jays’s season rises and falls with him more than any other player. But I supposed Martinez doesn’t really have to displace Bichette, given the infield tonight is Spencer Horwitz, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, and Ernie Clement. He has far more offensive upside than that trio, he might just not get enough major-league time to show it.
Fantasy Impact: There is a sort of catch-22 with Martinez as a fantasy resource, in that he’d be more exciting if he was joining a healthy, high-functioning Blue Jays offense, but his promotion might not have come now if the offense was either healthy or functioning at a high level. As it is, the 22-year-old is stepping in for what should be one of the team’s stars, Bichette, and stepping into a lineup that is 24th in the league in runs per game. —Jeffrey Paternostro
The aforementioned paradox does work in Martinez’s favor as well, though—if he were joining the team as an ancillary piece he might not be in a great position to put up the kind of stats we care about, but with Bichette out and the rest of the lineup looking pedestrian it could be an opportunity for the shortstop to occupy some valuable lineup real estate from day one. As noted above, if the thump in his bat plays at the highest level, Martinez is a very intriguing player both in real life and in our game. If you can’t risk the batting average hit or just simply don’t need the power that he brings, look elsewhere; otherwise, you’d do well to catch 13. (Sorry, not sorry.) —Nathan Grimm
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