By know you all know that the Jays didn't sign 3 of their top draft choices. Yeah, I'm not happy about it either, but I'm going to suggest it is possible that there is a strategy that the Jays might be working that we haven't thought about. The Jays picked more players, this year, that expected over slot money than they had in the past and signed some of them.
If a team doesn't sign a top round draft choice they receive a similar pick in the next season's draft. So if you were drafting would pick someone you might not sign knowing that next year you could take someone that is more signable. I mean, why not take a shot at someone you might not be able to sign. If you sign them, great. If you don't, well you can use those same picks next year. Now the second year if you don't sign the pick you are out of luck so you have to be more careful.
Next year, well it works better, you get more picks, some you can take chances on and hope you can sign some of them. The picks you get for not signing the guys this year you are more careful with.
If next year's draft is as deep or deeper than this year's you really don't lose that much. Let's say you get 1 or 2 guys that you wouldn't have if you weren't willing to take a chance on signing them and also get the safe picks that you would have been taking in the first place.
Yeah I know, too much of an apologist. But if you keep using this strategy, year after year, it might work out well in the long run.