Its opening day in the minor leagues. Buffalo's game has already been rained out with the games in New Hampshire and Michigan in doubt too. Dunedin could be our only hope for a game. But before the games begin it's time to talk about the minor league updates. The first MLU on Da Box was published on April 10, 2004. Alex Rios was in AAA, Aaron Hill in AA and a host of players who we had high hopes for were scattered through the system. Those of you with long memories might remember Vito Chiarravalotti, who we got excited about for a while before we learned that first basemen who mash in short season ball don't always make it to the big leagues.

I wrote my first MLU on April 12th, 2004. The Jays had a minor league team in Charleston and Greg Zaun was playing for the Jays AAA team in Syracuse. 2017 will be the 14th year of minor league coverage on Da Box, the longest continuous coverage of the Blue Jays minor leagues on the internet.

Minor league rosters will be announced this week. The Blue Jays do not release rosters until the home town teams have their chance to announce their teams first. Most of those announcements will come today and tomorrow. Some of the reporters covering the major league team will have some news sooner, and as I type this the Fisher Cats have released their roster.

It will take you a little bit longer for you to get inside Coca-Cola Field in Buffalo from now on. The team recently announced it will have metal detectors at the ballpark entrances in place for the 2017 season.


Metal detectors will greet fans heading to Bisons games starting Opening Day April 6. (Image from BallparkReviews.com)

Steve Ewen of The Vancouver Province says new turf may be installed at Nat Bailey Stadium in 2017 due to some bad hops in the infield.


The infield may have a different look at Nat Bailey Stadium this upcoming season.

The Toronto Blue Jays have rounded out its minor league managing and coaching staffs for the 2017 season. The most notable move sees Blue Jays legend Devon White (or Whyte) becoming the new hitting coach of the Buffalo Bisons.


Devon White will be in charge of the Blue Jays Triple-A hitters in 2017.

A few things of note in the Blue Jays minor league system. The Bluefield Blue Jays will continue to play ball at Bowen Field in 2017 and 2018 after the club agreed to a two-year extension of its Player Development Contract with Toronto. Bluefield joins Buffalo, New Hampshire, Lansing and Vancouver in having their stays extended for the next two seasons.


The Bluefield Blue Jays have been affiliated with Toronto since the 2011 campaign.

The final reveal! We have a top 10 list that looks a lot like last year's edition. Eight players return along with two new draftees. Max Pentecost and D.J. Davis hightail it out of the top 10.

We hope you enjoyed this year's list. A big thank you goes out to #2JBrumfield, sam and Thomas for helping select the top 30 and preparing the player stats and descriptions.

Day two of prospecting takes us to the numbers 11 through 20 prospects.

The new administration is very protective of prospects and draft picks. One piece of evidence supporting this assertion is that all thirty of last year's Batter's Box top 30 prospects are still with the organization. Those 30 prospects have been bolstered with the 2016 draft class plus two prospects who came over in the Liriano trade.

The expectation of the top 30 prospects for any team is that one third will improve, one third will regress and one third will stay as they were. Thirteen of last year's top 30 prospects did not make it onto this year's list. Some of them have indeed regressed but the addition of this year's draftees, and the traded players, has raised the level of the top 30. A player who might have made the list last year, and who has maintained his performance level, might not make the list this year. In other words, this is a deeper system than 2015's. Baseball America has suggested that the Blue Jays now have a top 10 system, as compared to a bottom 10 system last year. On some top 30 lists the players in the 21 -30 range are barely prospects. This year's Blue Jay bottom third prospects includes some very good players. A strong top 30 needs star power at the top and depth at the bottom and this year's list has both.

BA has published their top ten prospects for 2016. It is interesting to note that all ten of last years top ten are still with the system, none were traded this year. That is not surprising after last years clear-out sale.

The Dunedin Blue Jays saw their season come to a heartbreaking end Thursday night.

After playing 13 innings on Tuesday the Jays and Yankees played another 15 innings on Wednesday. Ultimately the Jays won to setup the winner take all game on Thursday.

The Dunedin Blue Jays are one loss away from the end of their season.

The affiliates won one out of four to close out the regular season.

The Blue Jays will have just one team in the playoffs this season. That team is the Dunedin Jays who will face off against the Tampa Yankees on Tuesday. All other teams have been eliminated and as a result Sundays games were pretty insipid. With the season end upon us some teams are just going through the motions and all the affiliates lost.