Perhaps the nicest thing about the Angels' run this year has been that this is the first playoff team in franchise history to be made up substantially of home-grown players. The accidental champions of 1979 and 1986 were mainly free agents and trade acquisitions who would be gone from the team in a year or two; the best previous team, the 1982 team that blew a two-game lead to the Brewers, (remembered in this article) had only one player on the roster who had been exclusively with the team. Kids can follow and grow attached to this year's team, the way I grew up and followed the Dodgers in the '70's; players like Salmon, Glaus, Erstad, Anderson, Percival, et al., are career Angels, and give this team a distinct identity.

In any event, I'm going to be watching the next two games up in Frisco; my sister is moving, and I'm going to hang out with my college friends for a few days. In the meantime, my posts will be infrequent....