Mets set sights on Sandy Alderson, White Sox assistant GM Rick Hahn as general manager candidates  —  MLB Consultant for Dominican Operations Sandy Alderson visits the New York Mets Dominican Summer League facility.  He might be more involved with the Mets very soon.

Yanks head home with 2-0 series lead over Twins  —  MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Andy Pettitte and the New York Yankees stumbled through September and landed in the AL wild-card spot.  —  As the Minnesota Twins can attest, the Yankees are hardly an underdog in October.

Baldelli out, Aybar in on Rays roster  —  ST. PETERSBURG, Fla.—The Tampa Bay Rays removed designated hitter/outfielder Rocco Baldelli from their playoff roster Thursday and added Willy Aybar.  —  The move was announced before the AL East champions faced the Texas Rangers in Game 2 of their first-round series.

Barry Zito left off Giants' roster  —  SAN FRANCISCO — The San Francisco Giants are sending $126 million to the sidelines.  Struggling left-hander Barry Zito has been left off the team's playoff roster for its best-of-five National League Division Series against the wild-card Atlanta Braves.

MLB players want offseason meeting  —  PHILADELPHIA — Representatives from the Major League Baseball Players' Association are trying to organize what would be a rare meeting between umpires, players and the commissioner's office to discuss growing concerns about the state of umpiring in Major League Baseball.

Samuel on Brewers' radar  —  By Tom Haudricourt of the Journal Sentinel  —  Dan Connolly, baseball writer for the Baltimore Sun, tells me that former Orioles third base coach and interim manager Juan Samuel has spoken informally to the Brewers about their managerial vacancy and hopes to be interviewed for the position.

Dave Roberts now first base coach  —  SAN DIEGO — Dave Roberts is returning to the field as first base coach of the San Diego Padres.  —  The former major leaguer will move over from his current role as a special assistant in the baseball operations department.

Hall chats about new direction with fans  —  Club president fields questions during online chat … Derrick Hall: Welcome to today's chat.  It has been busy around here as you all know, but the dust is beginning to settle.  I just came upstairs from watching the Instructional League game here between the D-backs and the Rockies.

Brett Favre's Cellphone Seduction Of Jenn Sterger (Update) … 02:30 PM  —  6,277  —  4  —  By Adam Dachis … Thuuz Lets Sports Fans Know Which Games Were Great (or Not)  —  Sports fanatic or not, you can't catch every game.  Thuuz helps you make the difficult choices by ranking games …

Baseball Thoughts: Day 2  —  Well, this will be a different kind of baseball live blog... we're not going to do the minute-by-minute or inning-by-inning thing because, well, we're just not going to do that.  —  But you can check back throughout the day for baseball thoughts, rants, jokes …

A transcript of Stan Kasten's final press conference  —  Outgoing Nationals president Stan Kasten talked with reporters for about a half-hour on Wednesday afternoon, sitting in a leather chair in the Presidents' Club at Nationals Park and reflecting on his 4 1/2-season tenure with the team.