How Rule 5 picks Ka’ai Tom and Dany Jiménez fit the A’s needs
The Oakland A’s can claim one of the more successful Rule 5 Draft picks of the decade; the 2014 Mark Canha selection is reaping rewards as the San Jose native grows into one of baseball’s strongest, more underrated hitters on a top team. They may have stumbled into another unvarnished gem in the 2020 draft.
In the Major League portion of Thursday’s draft, the A’s selected left-handed outfielder Ka’ai Tom from the Cleveland Indians and right-handed pitcher Dany Jiménez from the Toronto Blue Jays. The A’s took two more right-handed pitchers in the draft’s minor league portion, including Brett Graves — who they lost to the Miami Marlins in the 2017 Rule 5 draft — and Zach Jackson from Toronto.
Potential for Tom and Jiménez to nestle into key active roster roles seems likely.
At 5-foot-9, Tom is characterized as an undersized outfield prospect perhaps spurned in 2020 by the short season. The clear upsides could outweigh the negatives — for a smaller player, Tom packs a punch at the plate. The 26-year-old left-handed hitter wasn’t placed on the Indians’ 60-man roster in 2020, but batted .290 with a .912 OPS in 2019 with the triple-A Columbus Clippers and double-A Akron RubberDucks.
With switch-hitting corner outfielder Robbie Grossman potentially departing in free agency, the A’s are in the market for more depth in the outfield — particularly from the left side. In Tom, Oakland gets a compact left-handed hitter with defensive versatility. He’s played 164 games in left field, 149 in center field and 118 in right field throughout his five-season minor league career.
“He’s a patient hitter who makes a lot of hard contact and hits line drives,” A’s assistant general manager Dan Feinstein said in a Zoom call with reporters. “He has enough pull power to occasionally hit a home run, but we expect him to hit the ball hard to all fields.”
Patience at the plate — a keen, selective eye — is a common thread that runs through Oakland’s most highly-touted hitting prospects.That may give Tom an edge for a role on the 2021 team over some left-handed corner outfield prospects already in the A’s system. He may be competing with someone like Seth Brown, who’s shown some ability to perform at a big league level but hasn’t gotten much opportunity.
He also may cut in front of Luis Barrera, a left-handed outfield prospect known for his exceptional defense. But Barrera has struggled with his patience at the plate. And the A’s may find that Tom’s strengths at the plate are favorable to Barrera’s.
“Tom has propensity to hit the ball hard in the air, where Luis uses his legs more, hits the ball on the ground,” Feinstein said. “Probably similar defensive versatility but the batted ball profile is a little different.”
With Tom under their wing, Oakland dove head first into the right-handed pitching pool. Dany Jiménez will vie for a spot in the bullpen toting a power 98 mph fastball and a slider “slider with depth and finish,” Feinstein said.
“We think there are a couple things we can tweak mechanically that will help take advantage of the stuff he has.”
Jiménez, 26, comes to the A’s via Toronto, but is no stranger to the Bay Area. He made his big league debut with the San Francisco Giants last season — who selected him in the 2019 Rule 5 draft — but stumbled into a three-walk, one-earned run, one out outing in his debut. The Giants designated him for assignment, and he returned to the Jays organization.
If Jiménez can touch his ceiling and fold into the bullpen mix, the A’s could be very close to a powerful staff. Even with potential losses of Joakim Soria, Yusmeiro Petit, T.J. McFarland and, most importantly, Liam Hendriks. Jiménez completes a powerful stable that features J.B. Wendelken, Jake Diekman, Jordan Weems, Lou Trivino returning to form and possible contributions from Wandisson Charles, Miguel Romero, James Kaprielian and Grant Holmes.
Who’d the A’s lose?
A number of strong prospects were subjected to the Rule 5 this year that teams passed over — including pitching prospects Parker Dunshee and Brian Howard and outfielder Buddy Reed. The A’s lost one player, right-handed pitcher Seth Martinez, in the minor league portion to the Houston Astros.
Martinez, a 17th-round selection in the 2016 draft, had a 3.11 ERA in four seasons (108 games, 11 starts) in the A’s farm system.