Jays sign Harrison Ray

I’m sure we’ll hear about a few of these signings over the next little while. The Blue Jays have signed Harrison Ray to a UDFA deal.

He was a teammate (and have known each other since they were young) of first round pick Austin Martin at Vanderbilt.

Baseball America had him at number 441 on their list of 500 top draft prospects. They said:

A 5-foot-11, 190-pound infielder, Ray would have gotten plenty of attention as a senior sign in the 5-10 round range in a typical draft year thanks to his versatility and raw tools. While Ray has struggled to put up consistent offensive numbers over his Vanderbilt career and strikes out too much—24.8 percent whiff rate for his career—he can play every infield position and has good arm strength, average raw power and above-average running ability. He’s more of a fringy defender at shortstop who could fill in at the position in a pinch, and he has never gotten his power to translate to games consistently. Because of his question marks, a utility role in some capacity is Ray’s most likely fit at the next level, but there’s some interesting upside that could be unlocked if a team can get more out of Ray’s bat.