Jay Caruso:

The Angels played well against the Yankees this year, but it was also when they were able to face people like Kevin Brown, Alex Graham, Al Leiter and Buddy Groom.

Wasn't Kevin Brown's tenure on the Yankees just part of a Patrick Duffy nightmare? It never really happened, right?

Yes, the baseball playoffs start this week. Yes, New York, that means sleep deprivation and staying up past 1 a.m. to catch the last out and first few minutes of the post-game. By contrast any school kid was able to watch the Bucky Dent home run and Yankees win over the Red Sox in the 1978 one-game playoff.

Some thoughts as the world stops so we can enter the baseball playoff season:

The Chicago White Sox don't have Jaret Wright or Scott Proctor. That means the Red Sox will have a lot more difficult time scoring runs during their series with the White Sox. Against good pitching the last week of the season, the Red Sox looked very, very tired. Even David Ortiz was trying to lay down bunts. This series isn't a gimme for the Kevin Millars.

The Cardinals are expected to win. They haven't had to face an awful lot of adversity this year. If they go down 1-0 to the San Diego Padres, panic could set in. Can the Cardinals come back? Their best bet is to not even try to find out.

Andy Pettitte Has Beaten The Braves...But Wearing Pinstripes Which Andy Pettitte will show up for the Astros in their series against the Braves? The guy who won 1-0 against Atlanta during the 1996 World Series, or the guy who blew Game Six against the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2001? You either get the best or the worst during the post-season with Andy Pettitte. For the Astros, their opening series could get ugly if they don't get the best.

Jay Caruso is right. The Yankees have a much better pitching staff than the Angels saw earlier this year. For the Angels, the good news is that they get to play the first two games of their series in Anaheim. The bad news is they'll have to bat against Randy Johnson with shadows in front of the pitchers' mound.

Over-Under. For the prime-time, Yankees-Angels game tomorrow night, the over-under on the number of Fox T.V. actors who are shown on camera sitting in the stands, pretending to be baseball fans, is 8.