The Blue Jays didn't wait around. Six days after taking Cole Carlon with the 39th overall pick as a supplemental first-rounder, Toronto had him signed, sealed and off to the minors.
Top @BlueJays pick (supplemental 1st rd) Cole Carlon signs for $2.4 million (slot 39 value = $2,571,700). @ASU_Baseball LHP, best slider in @MLBDraft w/an upper-80s beast. Also has a 93-95 mph fastball that reaches 98, fifth in NCAA D-I with 14.3 K/9.
The number itself is a story. Carlon got $2.4 million, just under the $2,571,700 slot value for pick 39 — basically full boat for a college arm at that draft spot. That's not a discount deal or a see-you-in-a-year standoff. That's a team writing a check fast because it doesn't want a guy like this anywhere near a negotiating table for long.
So what makes a 39th pick worth full slot money? The slider. Carlon's is a mid-to-upper-80s gyro breaker that he leans on more than any other pitch, and college hitters simply couldn't find it — reports out of Arizona State had opponents batting under .200 against it with a whiff rate north of 50%. Pair that with a fastball that sits in the mid-90s and touches 98, and you've got a 6-foot-5, 230-pound lefty who racked up strikeouts at an absurd clip during his time with the Sun Devils.
That combination is exactly why scouts had him rated as one of the best arms in a deep 2026 class, first-round talent that fell to the supplemental round for reasons that had nothing to do with stuff. Teams that get a player like that at pick 39 either got lucky on signability or got lucky on scouting departments elsewhere overthinking it. Either way, Toronto isn't complaining.
For a Blue Jays org that's leaned on pitching development to stay relevant in a brutal AL East, adding a lefty with a plus-plus slider and a fastball that flirts with triple digits is exactly the kind of long-term swing that can pay off in a couple years if the delivery and command hold up in pro ball. The bar for Carlon now isn't stuff — it's translating dominant college numbers into a starter's workload against better hitters.
There's no timeline yet on when Carlon starts pitching in a Blue Jays uniform in games that count, but the money and the urgency to get him signed tell you where the organization's confidence level sits. Keep an eye on where he lands in the farm system rankings once he starts logging pro innings — a slider this good tends to move fast.