New Hampshire mimicked the Red Sox by sweeping a doubleheader, but they didn’t even have the benefit of playing at their home ballpark. Las Vegas won, while Dunedin avoided the sweep behind some fine relief pitching from the usual suspects and some offence and defence from one of the hottest bats in the entire system. Only Lansing prevented a day of wins, from the parent club on down, as the Lugnuts lost convincingly to South Bend.

When I play a dope melody - Anything less than the best is a felony........
If there was a problem - Yo, I'll solve it
Check out the hook while my DJ revolves it - Ice Ice Baby!

Like the tune he once used for striding to the plate with the Orioles, Kevin Millar came through under pressure by rapping one to the left-center field gap to drive in the winning run.  That helped the Jays break a come from ahead 7-7 tie for an 8-7 victory over the Texas Rangers in 11 innings at Rogers Centre Wednesday night.  Word to your Texas mothers!  (but in a nice way for our Texas readers!).

At least Mother Nature came through for the other two affiliates.  I think Porky Pig said it best.

Friend of Batter's Box Jamey Newberg, proprietor of the best major league baseball e-mail newsletter on the planet, just posted a special edition of his daily missive to Texas Rangers (and other baseball) fans everywhere. Here's part of what he wrote:

We were on the road, starting a seven-game trip, losers of seven out of nine, facing the team with the best record in the American League, matched up against perhaps the most consistently dominating pitcher in the league ...

So I'm contemplating the Jays bullpen and a strange thought came to me. A Thought I do not remember ever experiencing before.

I think I trust Jason Frasor.

It must have been an exciting day in Las Vegas, with several lead changes, extra-inning scoring by both teams, and a walk-off victory for the 51s. Rain plagued two of the other affiliates, and Dunedin played the only 9 inning game on the night.

"if you're going to come out here and play, you might as well win."
-- Cito Gaston, yesterday

Today the Blue Jays enjoy their first off day, and it's safe to say that even those of us who were starry-eyed optimists about this year's team  (I think that's WillRain and myself) weren't expecting a 10-4 start.

The affiliates dropped three of four on Sunday.  To be honest, there wasn't a lot to get excited about.

MLB.com says don't be surprised if Raul Chavez gets his first start behind the plate for this afternoon's 1:07 p.m. EDT finale against Oakland at the Rogers Centre.

Marc Rzepczynski bounced back from a bad start to deliver a good one yesterday.  Brett Cecil came off a good start and had a bad one.  The Ryan's, Page and Koch, did not put their teams in a position to win.  New Hampshire had the only win and are leading their division.  Brian jeroloman stayed hot while the bats of David Cooper and Brian Dopirak appear to be warming up.

The day started well (New Hampshire) and ended well (Las Vegas) but the middle was kind of ugly - especially in Florida. When the dust settled, the affiliates shared a record of 2-2.

Toronto’s minor league affiliates won two of their three games on Thursday, as all three teams were involved in contests that were decided by two runs. Las Vegas’ offence centred around the home run, Dunedin’s was powered by their 1-2-3 and 9th hitters and New Hampshire saw a very fine pitching performance by their starter and a trio of relievers.

The Twins should be thankful they managed to take one out of four.  Roy Halladay and the offence were nails as the Jays creamed the Twinkies 9-2 Thursday night at the Metrodome.

Wearing number 42 to honour Jackie Robinson really agreed with the Jays yesterday as they thumped the Twins 12-2 Wednesday night in their penultimate regular season game at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome.  There's no truth to the rumour that every Jay will wear number 122 for tonight's game.  Besides, they got number 32 on the hill tonight and speaking of Hill, number 2 did more than alright in last night's ball game. 

The affiliates had some good pitching tonight.  Fabio Castro pitched six shutout innings, Alsn Farina started and did well.  Tim Collins was outstanding, again, in relief.  Henderson Alvarez and John Anderson also pitched well.