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NEW YORK - The Yankees won more games than any team in baseball this season. Hit more home runs, setting a franchise record of 244 in the process. Spent the most money on their payroll. Had the best home record.

Derek Jeter (left), Alex Rodriguez (center) and Mark Teixieira (right) helped the Yankees reach the World Series for the 40th time with a 5-2 win over the Angels in Game 6 of the ALCS. (Elise Amendola/AP)
Derek Jeter (left), Alex Rodriguez (center) and Mark Teixieira (right) helped the Yankees reach the World Series for the 40th time with a 5-2 win over the Angels in Game 6 of the ALCS. (Elise Amendola/AP)Read more

NEW YORK - The Yankees won more games than any team in baseball this season. Hit more home runs, setting a franchise record of 244 in the process. Spent the most money on their payroll. Had the best home record.

That, in shorthand, is the opponent the defending world champion Phillies will have waiting for them when the World Series begins at Yankee Stadium.

If they can make it there, they can make it anywhere?

The second half of the dance card was filled out last night in the Bronx when the Yankees dismissed the pesky but outgunned Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, 5-2, in Game 6 of the American League Championship Series to capture the 40th pennant in the storied history of the franchise. And, from New York's perspective, it was probably just as well that the series ended when it did.

By not having to go to a decisive seventh game, they will be able to have ALCS MVP CC Sabathia start Wednesday night, setting up at least the possibility that the lefthander could pitch three times before commissioner Bud Selig smiles into the cameras and hands over the big, shiny trophy.

(And, by the way, wonder what the mood will be like in Cleveland when a pair of pitchers traded by the Indians at the last two deadlines, Sabathia and the Phillies' Cliff Lee, face off in Game 1?)

It means that the Yankees earned an extra day of rest before the final push.

And it means they won't have to spend all of today listening to questions about whether they might possibly be in the process of blowing a lead of three games to one.

"The Phillies are tough," said Yankees senior managing partner Hal Steinbrenner. "We're worried. We're concerned. We're concerned about everybody. But we're every bit as good and we'll give them a run for their money."

Added leftfielder Johnny Damon: "We want four more wins and I feel very good about our chances. But the Phillies are a tough team. They beat us two out of three [earlier this season]."

The Angels are a good team, although they didn't always play like it in the ALCS. And when you get to the World Series, you aren't going to get persnickety about who your opponent is. You're just happy to be there yourself.

Still, there's no doubt that playing the Yankees adds a little spice to the proceedings.

(And, by the way, wonder what the mood will be in Queens, where Mets fans have to decide whether to root for the division-rival Phillies or the hated crosstown-rival Yankees?)

Even though the Bombers haven't been to the World Series since 2003, and haven't won it since 2000, they remain baseball's most recognizable franchise. The Yankees are Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio. Yogi Berra. Mickey Mantle. Derek Jeter. They're an international brand.

Besides, nothing tickles a Philadelphia fan quite like having one of the city's teams beat a representative from the Big Apple.

The Angels had one thing going for them last night. Unlike the first two games at the new Yankee Stadium, where frigid temperatures had many players wearing flaps over their ears and their breath could clearly be seen when they exhaled, the temperature at first pitch was practically balmy: 58 degrees.

The cold seemed to rattle a California team that, normally fundamentally sound, helped give the first two games away with a series of blunders.

Once again last night, they turned in a sloppy performance. Vladimir Guerrero was doubled off first on a fly ball to right in the second. In the eighth, Guerrero started to trot to first when Mariano Rivera delivered a pitch that was clearly outside. Oops. It was only ball three. Then the defense crumbled in the bottom of the inning, committing errors on back-to-back plays when the Yankees were trying to give them outs with sacrifice bunts.

That's not why they lost, though.

They were just done in by the relentless Yankees attack that threatened in the first (runners on first and second), threatened in the second (bases loaded) and finally broke through against starter Joe Saunders.

Saunders didn't help himself by walking five batters in his 3 1/3 innings, three of them in the fourth when the Yankees knocked him out of the game.

They scored three runs. It turned out to be all they needed as starter Andy Pettitte won the fifth postseason clinching game of his career and Rivera finished it off with a two-inning save.

It's been said that to be the best, you have to beat the best.

Which is exactly what the Phillies will be trying to do starting Wednesday night.

Extra innings

Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez extended his postseason hitting streak to 11 games with a first-inning single . . . The run allowed by Mariano Rivera in the eighth was the first postseason earned run he has given up at home since Oct. 22, 2000, Game 2 of the World Series against the Mets.