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Will Wagner and Orelvis Martínez should split the Blue Jays designated hitter role.
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Photo credit: © Jonathan Dyer - USA Today
Ryley Delaney
Mar 17, 2025, 07:00 EDTUpdated: Mar 17, 2025, 06:55 EDT
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There are a whole lot of prospects ready for MLB action with not a lot of spots left.
One spot that remains open is the Toronto Blue Jays designated hitter role. Before the last two seasons, the Blue Jays rotated players using it to rest them. In the past two seasons, the Jays used it on veteran hitters Brandon Belt in 2023 and Justin Turner in 2024.
Well, this season there are plenty of MLB-ready prospects. Two of them don’t really have a defensive home despite having MLB-ready bats – Orelvis Martínez and Will Wagner. Both players bring something useful to the Jays and splitting the designated hitter role between them isn’t a bad idea.

Orelvis Martínez

Usually, you want your designated hitter to hit for power. Brandon Belt only hit 16 home runs in 2023 and Justin Turner hit six in 349 plate appearances before being traded at the trade deadline.
Martínez, on the other hand, is the perfect fit for the designated hitter role. Since the beginning of the 2021 season, his 103 home runs in 1800 plate appearances rank third in all of the minor leagues, only behind Luken Baker’s 112 homers and Ryan Ward’s 110 homers. It’s worth noting that Baker was 24 and Ward was 23 in 2021 while Martínez only turned 23 last November.
Looking at just the Blue Jays farm system from 2021 until 2024, Martínez ranked first  by a sizable margin, with the second-most home runs in that span coming from Damiano Palmegiani, who has 70. 
From 2021 until 2023, Martínez led the organization in home runs, but finished tied for third in 2024, largely thanks to his suspension.
 If we take his average total of plate appearances over the past three seasons, 493, his 16 home runs in 269 plate appearances before the suspension was on pace for 29 home runs, just over his average home run total the past three seasons.
Of course, Martínez’s hit tool lags by quite a bit. It was a big concern in 2022 as he struck out 28.5% of the time while slashing just .203/.286/.446. Since May 2023, it has improved to be slightly below average at worst.
The same cannot be said of his defence. Last season, Martínez played 316 innings at second base with the Bisons, committing 12 errors in just 38 games. In his only Major League Baseball game, he also committed an error.
Now, he’s only played second base since 2023, rising the Blue Jays ranks as a third baseman/shortstop, but it’s pretty clear it’s going to take some time for Martínez to become an average fielder at the keystone. In 195.1 innings at third base last season, he committed just three errors, with the most errors he committed at the hot corner being six in 105 innings back in 2021.
In short, Martínez’s bat is MLB ready, specifically, his power would be beneficial to the Blue Jays as he works to improve his defence.

Will Wagner

What Orelvis Martínez lacks in his hit tool, Will Wagner makes up.
The son of soon-to-be-Hall-of-Famer Billy Wagner, the Houston Astros selected Will in the 2021 draft. In July 2024, the Astros sent him to the Blue Jays, along with Jake Bloss and Joey Loperfido, for Yusei Kikuchi.
After the trade, Wagner had a good showing for himself, posting a .305/.337/.451 slash line with two home runs in 86 plate appearances. Unfortunately, his season ended a bit early as he underwent surgery on his knee.
There isn’t a large sample size of his work in Major League Baseball. However, Wagner ranks as MLB Pipeline’s ninth-best Blue Jays prospect in their 2025 pre-season update, with his 55-hit tool being his best tool.
Positionally, his defensive home is second base but the Blue Jays acquired Andrés Giménez in the off-season. Third base is up for grabs (with even Martínez contending for it) but Wagner’s arm may not be strong enough to play the position.
Instead, the Blue Jays could get Wagner’s bat in the lineup by slotting him as the designated hitter while moving him around the infield. The question is, where in the lineup would he fit? Well, thanks to his hitting ability and on-base skills, he’d make a good lead-off hitter while pushing George Springer further down the order.

How would this work

The Toronto Blue Jays have two main needs in their lineup – a third baseman and a designated hitter. Both Orelvis Martínez and Will Wagner have the ability to play the hot corner, so rotating them at third and the designated hitting role isn’t a bad idea.
One player gives the Blue Jays a lead-off hitter with a good hit tool while the other player gives the Jays a middle-of-the-order bat with some thump. Going this route would also push Ernie Clement to a super-utility role to give Bo Bichette and Andrés Giménez a break.
Ryley Delaney is a Nation Network writer for Blue Jays Nation, Oilersnation, and FlamesNation. They can be followed on Twitter @Ryley__Delaney.

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