NOTES

St. Louis Cardinal slugger Mark McGwire set a single-season home run record with 70 this season, and Yankee third baseman Scott Brosius added an MVP postseason to a year in which he batted .300 with 19 homers and 98 runs batted in.

And to think, both could have been Angels this season. The Walt Disney Co. nixed a deal in July 1997, that would have sent McGwire and Brosius from Oakland to Anaheim for center fielder Jim Edmonds, third baseman Dave Hollins and a prospect.

According to baseball sources, Angel General Manager Bill Bavasi had the deal worked out--several Angels even asked McGwire before the trading deadline what uniform number he was going to wear in Anaheim--but Disney didn’t believe it could afford to re-sign McGwire, and the trade was scuttled.

So instead of an infield with McGwire and Brosius at the corners, the Angels wilted in the heat of a pennant race with rookie third baseman Troy Glaus and either hobbled Darin Erstad or rookie Chris Pritchett at first.