In preparation for the top 30 prospect series which will begin tomorrow, it is helpful to have a sense of the league standards and park factors for each of the affiliates- Syracuse in the International League, New Hampshire in the Eastern League, Dunedin in the Florida State League, Lansing in the Midwest League, Auburn in the New York Penn League and the GCL Jays in the Gulf Coast League.

The Jays announced their R. Howard Webster Award winners, for the top players at each levels of the minors yesterday.

Baseball America will announce their top 20 prospects in each minor league over the next couple of weeks.  The top 20's start Thursday with the Gulf Coast League.  Two Blue Jays are featured, John Tolisano and Kevin Ahrens.  As BA moves through the minor leagues players like Brett Cecil, JP Arencibia, Travis Snider and Kyle Ginley will be looking to make the lists.  Snider will likely be the #1 prospect in the Midwest League.  Robinzon Diaz and Brian Jeroloman have outside chances of being named in the Eastern League and the Florida State League respectively, perhaps Adam Lind in the International League if enough managers saw him play.

How would the Doubledays and starter Brett Cecil perform in the second game of the Best-of-3 series against a very good Brooklyn Cyclones team, knowing that the first league title in franchise history was only one win away?

Auburn took the opening game of their 3 game set with Brooklyn by a 7-1 score.

Auburn moves onto the NY-Penn League Championship after defeating Oneonta 4-3.

The Auburn Doubledays live to fight another day thanks to a dominating pitching performance from the hardest name to spell in the system.  The relief pitching wasn't half bad either and the offence finally showed up in the series.  It all boils down to a third and deciding game between Auburn and Oneonta tonight at Falcon Park. 

Auburn began their playoff run Sunday with game one, on the road, in Oneonta.  Games two and three are back in Auburn Monday and Tuesday.  This was a close game, read on to see what happened.

The Lugnuts were eliminated tonight, while the Doubledays warmed up for the playoffs with a couple of longballs. 

We close out our Friday summaries with the hitters this week.  It has been a disappointing year for the hitters, with only Travis Snider shining and Yohermyn Chavez holding his own.

This is the last week of the minor leagues regular season and it is a good time to look back at 2007 and the performances of the top 30 Blue Jay prospects from a year ago. The Batters Box minor league team will produce this years top 30 list soon but many of these players will drop off the prospect lists. This is also a good time to evaluate how successful was the 2007 minor league season. In summary this has been a disappointing season for the minor league system, many more prospects have regressed than progressed. The one positive aspect is many of the prospects moving ahead are in, or close to, the major leagues.

Travis Snider provided the only remotely positive news on the minor league front, as the affiliates went 0-2.

New Hampshire lost a 7-4 decision to Portland to lose out on a shot at the playoffs.

Leave it to the Chiefs to win the one game I didn't want them to!  Before anyone dares to complain that my Jays fan club card should be revoked for that statement, it was a nothing game for Syracuse and I would've liked to have seen the Lynx finish things off on a winning note.  On a personal note, it's a sad day for me that the Lynx are leaving because I've been a fan of theirs since Day 1.  Anyways, the affiliates went 3-1 on the night but the one loss was a tough one as a prominent rehabbing Jays reliever was tagged with the "L".   As a result, New Hampshire will have to play one more game to see if they can sneak into the post season. 

Three wins for the affiliates and all of them in extra innings.  Auburn won in 10 innings even though they had only four hits, Syracuse won in 12 innings and Lansing were outhit 20-16 but won in 13 innings.

Dunedin's season finished yesterday, for good.  Syracuse, Dunedin and the GCL Jays are out of the playoffs.  Lansing and Auburn are in the playoffs.  New Hampshire are tied with Portland for the last playoff spot in the Eastern league.  Both teams are at 70-71, uninspiring records, and both are on losing streaks, Portland's is at four games, New Hampshire's at two games.  On Monday, in the final game of the regular season Ricky Romero will face Tyler Clippard of Trenton to see if he can pitch New Hampshire into the playoffs.

The Auburn Doubledays clinched the division title and a playoff spot Saturday.  Josh Banks made a strong claim for a promotion.  With Lansing and Auburn in the playoffs the other teams in contention continued to slip.  Dunedin lost their fourth in a row and are now out of the playoffs.  New Hampshire are a half game back with two games left, three games left for Portland, their rivals in the chase.  The Dunedin and New Hampshire offenses have struggled with the playoffs in sight.