Indians rate preferential treatment  —  The story lines would have been predictable and bombastic had the Red Sox met the Yankees again in the American League Championship Series.  Imagine the hysteria if the Sox and Yankees clashed in the playoffs for the first time since the historic hurt …

Tribe throw 1-2 punch  —  Sabathia, Carmona have fought long fight … Mark Shapiro sat in the visitors dugout at Fenway Park [map] one rainy day in 2003, predicting that an emotional, 22-year-old mountain of a man named C.C. Sabathia could one day enter baseball's pitching elite.

Picture These First Two Acts  —  Beckett Vs. Sabathia, Then Schilling-Carmona  —  BOSTON - David Ortiz was walking out of a movie theater Monday night, having taken his kids to see "The Game Plan," when he got a real-time update on the Yankees-Indians game.

NLCS features homegrown talent  —  Last week, on the day that the Diamondbacks were to play their first postseason game in the past five years, General Manager Josh Byrnes spent part of his morning with farm director A.J. Hinch in Tucson, watching some of the organization's top prospects compete in the instructional league.

If Torre is not brought back, new manager will be walking into no-win situation  —  NEW YORK - While waiting for George Steinbrenner to pull the lever that opens the trap door underneath his manager of 12 seasons to start the whole string of implosions, we wonder.