These are the games that test a club's mettle: drab affairs in September against a team that, though eliminated, is playing confident baseball.

There are reasons to expect the Blue Jays to show some life, however. Aaron Hill should give the Jays' brass a chance to see just what their middle infield options look like for next year and beyond. Dave Bush -- and, possibly, Josh Towers -- are pitching for not-yet-assured slots in the 2006 rotation. And if Gus wants to have a shot at Rookie of the Year, he's going to need his last five starts to all be good ones.

This week's Scout features some minor league news, an acknowledged "good guy" and some unfortunate stereotyping of the sort discussed by Jordan in his last Game Report.

On to the Advance Scout!

It's Friday, so feel free to Caption At Will:

The Doubledays are the last farm affiliate left standing, and closed out the regular season last night with a 6-1 win.

Surprisingly, only 31 men with the surname "Jackson" have played in the big leagues; maybe Reggie's mouth just made it seem like more.

Two of them, Reggie and Travis, are enshrined in the Hall of Fame (Gaylord Jackson Perry, while also in Cooperstown, is not elgigble for this team), while the best Jackson ever to play isn't in the Hall, as Shoeless Joe "ain't so" eligible for induction. Five of the other 18 have made All-Star team, and Bo knows that's an awfully good percentage.

But this looks like another team that, no matter how good its pitching is, will have an awful lot of passed balls ...

The Dunedins are done, the Doubledays are drawing to a close

Shea Hillenbrand angrily walks out of the batter's box, back towards the dugout:

Well, that was a win for the Blue Jays. Not a very exciting win -- not the kind of game that you sit around years from now and say, "Hey, remember that 7-4 victory in Baltimore in September 2005? Man, that was classic." Now, if Orlando Hudson's injury turns out to be anything remotely serious, then yeah, we'll remember this one in a bad way. But otherwise, well, yawn, frankly. So what can we talk about this morning?

Initially Speaking, That Is

We continue our double twist on the Hall of Names (initially speaking) ... who are the best double-initial players for each of the first 23 letters of the English alphabet?

As mentioned last time (see AA through CC), that's not a random stopping point; there has never been a major league player whose last name began with "X" and none of the "Y" and "Z" players had alliterative first names. (Jimmie "Double X" Foxx, though a worthy Hall of Famer, here obviously is not a true Hall of Namer.) Well, unless you count RHRP George Washington "Zip" Zabel, who was 12-14 for the 1913-15 Cubbies -- that's your alliterative double-initial Chicago Cubs.

Then again, it turns out that three of the other letters -- I.I. and Q.Q. don't have any candidates, either, and there are just two V.V.'s while Ugueth Urbina is pretty much flying solo in the "UU" category, so we'll settle for, at best, 20 double-letter teams; here are three more ...

The Jays finally put some runs on the board, and thanks to Gregg Zaun, even managed to put one pitch over the wall. But it was a costly win, as Orlando Hudson left the game with a foot injury that might be pretty serious. Russ Adams also took a hard fall in the ninth inning on his second error of the ballgame, so all kinds of misadventures in the middle infield tonight. Toronto takes the season series 10-9 -- look for these two teams to be playing more significant September games in the near future.

Sparky and Hillenbrand probably gave him the gears afterwards -- here's Alex Rios getting the heck out of the way of a pitch:

The D'Jays lost the first game of their 3 game playoff series and the Doubledays won as they prepare for their own playoff run.

These days, it seems you can't go to a major league ball game without having a Rodriguez hitting in the middle of one team's order or trotting out of the other team's bullpen in the late innings. The name has become so pervasive that there is a generic blanket nickname for the Rodriguez boys: first-initial-Rod, from A-Rod to K-Rod, H-Rod to I-Rod and F-Rod, these less-than-creative nicknames so abound that one is tempted to scream, enough, all-Roddy!

Anyway ... it was not always thus. In fact, just 28 men have played in the big leagues bearing the surname/family name "Rodriguez," and all but six of those have debuted in The Show since Orwell's dystopian novel became passe in 1984.

In fact ...

When you have a lineup that’s really struggling to score runs, a young pitcher with dynamite stuff who chooses this night to put it all together, and a home-plate umpire who doesn’t feel like squeezing the strike zone, this is the kind of result you’re going to get: a 6-0 whitewash by the Orioles of a Blue Jays ballclub that’s stumbling down the stretch.

Okay, that must be why the Orioles like Daniel Cabrera so much. A dominating performance from the Baltimore righty, a not-exactly-great return to the rotation by Ted Lilly, and a box score featuring about a dozen members of the 2003 New Haven Ravens. Any good signs from the Blue Jay youngsters tonight?

Let the playoffs begin!