Best-bets for Oct. 22: Athletes bat, skate and smash

1) Sports surge. Baseball and college football collide. The former has two best-of-seven series, sending winners to the World Series. Today, Aaron Judge (shown here) and the Yankees host the Astros at 5:07 p.m. ET on TBS; the Padres-Phillies game is, 7:45 on Fox. That faces lots of football, including Mississippi State (ranked No. 24) at Alabama (No. 6) at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN, Minnesota at Penn State (No. 16) at 7:30 on ABC and Kansas State (No. 17) at Texas Christian (No. 8) at 8 on Fox Sports1. Read more…

1) Sports surge. Baseball and college football collide. The former has two best-of-seven series, sending winners to the World Series. Today, Aaron Judge (shown here) and the Yankees host the Astros at 5:07 p.m. ET on TBS; the Padres-Phillies game is, 7:45 on Fox. That faces lots of football, including Mississippi State (ranked No. 24) at Alabama (No. 6) at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN, Minnesota at Penn State (No. 16) at 7:30 on ABC and Kansas State (No. 17) at Texas Christian (No. 8) at 8 on Fox Sports1.

2) Figure skating, 3 p.m., NBC, rerunning at 8 on USA. There are finals today for men and pairs, but the women tend to be the big draw. They have their short programs today and their finals at 2 p.m. Sunday. Also, there’s rhythm dance today; Sunday has free dance and a closing exhibition.

3) “Hair Tales” debut, 9 and 10 p.m., Oprah Winfrey Network, or any time, Hulu. Sprawling through vast chunks of Black history are changing approaches to hairstyles. At one extreme were the old efforts at straightening; at another were the crowning Afros of Angela Davis and other 60s militants. Now Tracee Ellis Ross (“Black-ish”) has a six-part series, in which she talks to Winfrey and others.

4) “Criss Angel’s Magic With the Stars” debut, 8 p.m., CW. Magic has been a TV staple, ever since Chan Canasta did it for Ed Sullivan and others, 70 years ago. It’s visual and entertaining – if you just let it be. This show doesn’t do that; a few minutes of impressive tricks (by Corbin Bleu and Miles Brown) are surrounded by talk and “judging.” We knew the praise would be overblown when Loni Love, a good comedian, was introduced as a “superstar.”

5) ALSO: At 8 p.m., you can catch reruns of “The Real Love Boat” on CBS or “Quantum Leap” on NBC. CBS follows with two “48 Hours” episodes. NBC follows with “Dateline” at 9 and “Saturday Night Live” reruns at 10 and 11:29; the latter is the first rerun of the “SNL” season, which started with three straight new episodes. (There’s a new one next week, with Jack Harlow.) And at 9 and 9:30, CW opens the “World’s Funniest Animals” season.

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