Welcome to the Batter's Box Top 30 Blue Jay prospects for 2014. Five of your trusted minor league correspondents pooled their votes to come up with the list. The same trusty five shared the task of writing the prospect descriptions you see below. Come back tomorrow for numbers 20 through 11.

There is turnover from 2013. Marcus Stroman, Kevin Pillar and Ryan Goins have all graduated. Aaron Sanchez still qualifies as he was called up in mid-July, giving him less than 45 days service before September. Tom Robson, Clinton Hollon and Adonys Cardona were injured and didn't pitch enough to make it on this year's list. Kenny Wilson and Deck McGuire were traded. They make room for a new crop of exciting prospects who shot onto the scene in 2014, starting with a holdover at number 30.

The Vancouver Canadians have unveiled its expansion plans for Nat Bailey Stadium in 2015.


An artist rendering of the Nat Bailey Expansion Project was unveiled at the stadium during the Vancouver Canadians World Series Party for Nat Pack and season ticket holders.

With the amazing year we've seen in the Jays minors it got me to thinking about prospects and how the Jays ones have done and what is the best year we've ever seen.  Could we currently have the strongest farm in Jays history?  Doubtful, but lets do a check.

A second straight month of co-winners! Congratulations go out to Scott Copeland, Franklin Barreto and Rowdy Tellez for winning the last monthly installments of the Batter's Box Minor League awards.


Scott Copeland won Pitcher of the Month honours for August/September by earning four first-star selections to give him 20 points. Franklin Barreto and Rowdy Tellez earned 14 points apiece to share the Hitter of the Month hardware with two first-star selections as well as a second and a third. The 3 Stars voting by the Batter's Box Minor League Crew is done on a 5-3-1 points system.

Now that everyone has had a chance to recover from the minor league season, the news flow is starting again. This week the Jays announced their award winners and Baseball America have started publishing their League their top 20's.

Another successfull season for the Canadians came to an end last night, but unfortunately the Canadians streak of three consecutive Northwest League championships came to an end. 

The Canadians fell behind early 4-0, they managed to score 3 runs, but it wasn't enough, as they fell 4-3, losing the series 2 games to none.

The Vancouver Canadians will need to win two on the road if they hope to win their fourth straight Northwest League championship after dropping Game 1 at Nat Bailey Stadium Saturday night.

Vancouver moves on and will once again vie for the Northwest League Championship.

The Vancouver Canadians won a nail-biter in Game 1 of the Northwest League North Division final at Nat Bailey Stadium Wednesday night. Pitching, defence and a bit of timely hitting helped the C's grab a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three series.


Ryan Borucki warms up in the pen with pitching coach Jeff Ware looking on. The Illinois native stranded two singles by striking out the side in order to end the first inning and survived a leadoff triple. The 15th round pick of 2012 stranded all six runners over seven shutout innings by giving up just five hits. He plunked a batter but struck out four. He also got some help from left fielder Jonathan Davis with three of the best catches I've seen a left fielder make live since the days of Reed Johnson.

After a very strong season in Lansing and Dunedin, Taylor Cole had one of his most disappointing starts of the year, giving up 6 runs.  Dunedin was unable to come back from the early deficit, and lost the game, which gave Daytona a 2-0 series win.

Vancouver won a pitching duel in game 1 of their series versus Spokane, as Ryan Borucki and the bullpen were brilliant.

With playoff spots already wrapped up, the Vancouver Canadians and the Spokane Indians made one last curtain call for the regular season. This gave the C's a chance to give some playing time to their back-ups and put their singing talents to good use.


In a tradition that has taken place over the last few seasons, the Canadians players, coaches and other on-field personnel sing O Canada for the last regular season game at Nat Bailey Stadium. Among the players in the choir include #6 Richard Urena, #9 Justin Shafer, #16 Phil Kish and #47 Jairo Labourt. The tallest of the group is 6-foot-8 Matthew Smoral.

Two playoff games were scheduled for the affiliates but just one was played and it didn't turn out well...at all!

The Vancouver Canadians clinched the second-half North Division title with a comeback victory over the first-half champion Spokane Chiefs at Nat Bailey Stadium Sunday afternoon.


Matthew Smoral was given the start for the C's and he gutted his way through five innings, surrendering just two first-inning runs. The Ohio lefty had trouble finding the plate with his array of 77-94 MPH pitches by walking five batters. He received a visit from pitching coach Jeff Ware who presumably told Smoral to re-establish his fastball after going offspeed for a number of pitches. Smoral was able to induce two double plays and pick off a runner at first base to minimize the damage. His best inning was his last as he struck out two of the three batters he faced, including a swinging strikeout on an 82 MPH offering. He allowed three hits and struck out five.

The final day of the minor league regular season saw the affiliates come away with a 2-2 record. Buffalo and Vancouver put one in the win column. New Hampshire played for far too long and Lansing not enough.

On Sunday the affiliates were 2-3, with the wins coming from the affiliates heading to the playoffs in Vancouver, and Dunedin.  With the Canadians win, they qualified for the playoffs which start on Tuesday versus Spokane. Buffalo unfortunately was eliminated from the wild-card race, with a loss.