ORLANDO, Fla. – The Toronto Blue Jays once again strayed from the norm in search of Rule 5 Draft upside, selecting right-hander Spencer Miles from the San Francisco Giants to insert another wild-card into their bullpen mix.
Like Angel Bastardo, the right-hander they plucked from the Boston Red Sox last year, Miles is coming off Tommy John surgery. A key difference, however, is that 25-year-old has made only 10 pro appearances, none above low-A, plus five outings in the recently completed Arizona Fall League, since the Giants made him a fourth-round pick in 2022.
Bastardo, 23, had at least been up to double-A when the Blue Jays picked him in last year’s Rule 5, but he spent all of 2025 on the injured list. That means he and Miles will arrive at camp in similarly unusual situations – $100,000 bets trying to win bullpen spots with the defending American League champions, or be offered back to their original team.
“Both of them, we think, have stuff upside to impact us,” Blue Jays assistant general manager Mike Murov said Wednesday as the Winter Meetings wrapped up. “Our hope is both guys are really good and we're not even worried about that. But we'll let them tell us.”
Miles must spend the entire 2026 season in the majors or be offered back to the Giants for $50,000. Bastardo, because he spent all of 2025 on the IL, needs 90 active days on the roster next year before he can be optioned, otherwise he must be offered back to Boston.
Attempting to leverage the Rule 5 is a longstanding tactic for the Blue Jays, who in their early expansion years under Hall-of-Fame general manager Pat Gillick used the draft to select Willie Upshaw (1977), George Bell (1980), Jim Acker (1982), Kelly Gruber (1983) and Manny Lee (1984).
More recently, Joe Biagini became an important leverage reliever for the 2016 team that advanced to the ALCS, while in 2018, they selected Elvis Luciano, an 18-year-old pitching prospect eligible only because an initial contract had been voided and re-signed.
Picking both Bastardo and Miles demonstrates how the Blue Jays continue seeking ways to exploit all avenues of player acquisition, even amid their current payroll largesse.
The backstory on Miles, who is coincidentally spending the off-season with his girlfriend who happens to live in Dunedin, Fla., isn’t nearly as convoluted as that of Luciano.
He missed all of his first full season of pro ball in 2023 due to back surgery and then, after returning in 2024, made five appearances before suffering a flexor injury that led to elbow reconstruction surgery. Pitching in the AFL, he logged 8.2 innings over five outings, striking out 12 against just one walk, where both his stuff and command captured the Blue Jays’ attention.
“High upside stuff collection,” is Murov’s description. “Really like what we saw in the fall league, 95 mile-an-hour sinker that models as an elite weapon against right-handers, cutter that he can stick up in against lefties. What separated him in our look is relative to kind of the high-upside guys that are attainable in this, though there was actually command to go with it. … We think there's a chance that he comes in and clicks with the weapons he has.”
Aiding in that assessment is their background work into Miles’ maturity, while Justin Lehr, the Blue Jays’ minor-league pitching director, would have some familiarity with him after coming over from the Giants system last fall.
All of that, along with the adversity he’s already faced in his career, led the Blue Jays to believe Miles is ready to face the odds before him in sticking with a contending club for an entire season. The rest is up to the way he pitches.
“If he's able to post on a consistent basis and keep the command and keep the stuff, then he's a useful pitcher on any team,” said Murov. “We are hopeful that we see that version of him. And if we do, then it's going to be easy to keep him.”
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