Jim Turner of the fine website Toronto Baseball Guys is putting on a get-together at SkyDome along with the York Baseball Association. Take it away, Jim!

Greetings Bauxites,

When I'm not dissecting baseball online, I'm a coach and convenor with the York Baseball Association, a very fine youth league in the city's west end. Each year, we have Blue Jays ticket sale, and as a reward, our Rep teams get two hours of precious field time at the SkyDome. It's quite something to see an 11-year-old hit a gapper and then realize how far apart those bases are.

I do what I do best because I'm illing and able
Ain't no faking - your money I'm taking

There really isn't a whole lot to say. Once again the Jays offence stopped after the first half of the game. The Jays haven't been badly outplayed since the series in New York and yet have won just 1 game in the past 8.

Over the last 14 games, the Jays are 2-12 with 45 runs scored (just over 3 per game).

Well, we'vestarted experimenting with a brand new format in our ongoing quest to fill Baseball's "Hall of Names." A while back, it was the Ballpark franks," and more recently, the All-Steve team.

Now, maybe before we dive into some of the already-suggested ("All-Joe," "All-Bob," even "All-Bud" and of course I hope to assemble an overly impressive "All-Mick" team eventually) followups, how about we find out what members of Da Box's Rosterhave the best "baseball names"? Credibility Check forthcoming!

Now... you know him as "Coach," and he's the founding father of Da Box (Cue theme music to "The Boxfather" and make him an offer he can't refuse) but the birth certificate says "Kent Williams -- which, come to think of it, would have made him a perfectly reasonable candidate for the recent
all Two-first-names team.And there's the question ... could a team made up solely of Kents stay in the game with a team made up solely of Williamses?

Once again Canada built up an early lead and coasted to an easy victory. The Netherlands tossed a lefthander at the predominantly lefthanded batting lineup, but Pete Orr, Stubby Clapp and Pierre-Luc Laforest showed their disdain for that strategem by belting homeruns. Orr's drive to straight away centrefield with two men aboard put the Canadians in flight. The game story from Canadian Press paints a fuller picture.

The three front runners for the medals - Japan, Cuba and Canada - have all started with two wins. Canada took advantage of some erratic defence and scored 9 runs in the first two innings on route to a 9-3 victory over Italy. Check out the gory details from Canadian Press here.

In a recent thread a Batter's Box regular made the comment:

of course, we wouldn't even be having this discussion if Russ Adams hadn't turned out to be so terribly, terribly underwhelming, especially relative to his draft position.

Which lead a number of us to wonder how much we should expect from a mid 1st round draft pick. In "Has Russ Adams Been A Disappointment?" Craig Burley compared Adams to other players taken in the middle of the first round of 2002's draft. I thought I'd take a different approach.

Batter's Box regular Paul D takes a look at some late-summer reading.

With his Beatles and his Stones
We never got if off on that revolution stuff
It was such a drag

4 wins and 3 losses for the Blue Jay farm as a former top prospect makes an encouraging start, a previously unheralded prospect continues to command attention, and a brand new prospect makes his debut.

Or nearly so.

The season from hell continues with the Jays facing Pedro Martinez. Ted Lilly will have to induce flyballs to centre and right and not to left to be effective today.

The Inter-County Baseball League Championship Series starts today with London facing Guelph. Here’s a quick overview look at the two teams involved.

I decided to pull together a couple of rooting necessaries for those watching Team Canada's games from Athens, and reproduce some terrific photos from the IBAF (that's the international baseball federation, by the way). Enjoy!

New Hampshire stay hot. Curtis Thigpen digs the long ball. Pulaski win ugly. Zach Jackson makes his debut tonight. The minor league teams had a strong week, going 26-10. Dunedin, Charleston and Auburn were a combined 15-2.

Just like witches at black masses
Evil minds that plot destruction
Sorcerers of death construction