Glad to see people are using this. I think it, as the kids don't say anymore, rocks.

A quick word on Mike Mulder: I can't blame my copy editor. That was my brain cramp, and I confidently informed the copy editor "names CQ" when turning the column over. That means "trust me," and you know how it always turns out when someone says that.

Agreed the Puckett home run was pretty similar. And one of the all-time great TV calls, by Jack Buck: "We'll see you tomorrow night!" One of the things I can't decide about Joe Buck is whether I like it when he makes sly references to his dad. Last year one on one of the Red Sox game-winners, after midnight in extra innings, he said, "We'll see you later tonight." The other night, when the Gibson homer came up, he said, "Some people couldn't believe what they just saw."

As for Schmidt, for me, generally speaking, there's a hierarchy to these things that follows how late they are. World Series homers are bigger than LCS homers are bigger than division series homers are bigger than regular-season homers. There are exceptions, such as Bobby Thomson, whose homer was in the equivalent of the LCS. Like the Gibson homer, which was only in Game 1 after all, there are circumstances around that home run that make it loom larger than it might have.

Forgot to answer this:

The announcers for all World Series games will be Joe Buck and Tim McCarver. I asked Fox, and was told the third man in the booth is only an LCS thing. The flack I talked to didn't know why that's why they do it that way, but they've been doing it that way for a while. He and I agreed it was too bad because we both thought that Lou Piniella did a nice job. Bob Brenly was the third man in the other booth, and he was OK, same as in his pre-managing days.

I'm doing a chat in Table Talk Wednesday at 1 p.m. EDT.

We'll see how it goes. I imagine the group that enjoys talking in Table Talk will still want to do that even with this new letters system. Our experience over the years has been that people who like Table Talk just like Table Talk, often totally independent of the rest of Salon.

If the letters system remains as active as it's been today, without me specifically shilling for it in the column, I won't have time to manage it and do the TT chats, but like I said, we'll see how it goes.

Even if I stop doing the regular chats, I'll still drop in as long as people are talking there, and maybe I'll do an occasional chat if there's some sentiment for it.

Under Simmons' theory (not having read the piece), the Cardinals should have folded last year after Kent's homer to win Game 5. The A's won Game 3 of the '88 Series, two games after Kirk Gibson, on a Mark McGwire walkoff HR. Dodgers won the next two to win the Series.

That's off the top of my head. I'm sure there are others. The homers that lead to wins for losing ultimately losing teams aren't as memorable. I think momentum is bunk in baseball, and while I agree to a point with those who have said that all that standing around time gives baseball players plenty of time to stew over their worries or whatever, one of the skills that gets guys to the major leagues is being able to deal with just that kind of thing. More than a few big leaguers have said the toughest thing about baseball is the mental aspect of it, the grind of the season, staying on an even keel, etc.

I think over time very few series are decided because one team or the other got rattled.

How is Chicago-St. Louis not a Heartland Series?

I think it would be the I-55 Series, not the I-55/70. I-55 goes right through St. Louis, and then on to Memphis and points south. It joins up with 70 for a while there just before it crosses the river into Missouri, is all.

I think I-55 between Chicago and St. Louis is an awful, boring, ugly drive. Just my opinion. I like hills.

James (I think), we'll have to agree to disagree on the relative merits of Lidge and Moore. Comparing '86 Moore to '05 Lidge:

K/9IP, BB/9IP, HR/9IP

Lidge 13.12, 2.93, 0.64

Moore 6.56, 2.72, 1.24

WHIP

Lidge 1.15

Moore 1.13

ERA-plus

Lidge 181

Moore 138

They were about the same pitcher, except Lidge struck out twice as many guys and gave up half as many home runs. Those aren't small things. Moore was a good pitcher in '84-86, his best years by far. Lidge was dynamite last year and very, very good this year. Moore didn't strike fear in hitter's hearts like Lidge does.

Good call on all those home runs, Ryan. And how about all those Yankees home runs in the 2001 World Series? Yeah, no way the Diamondbacks recover from those babies.

Fox really doesn't care how many people are watching at the end of the game, at least not on the East Coast. It cares how many people are watching during prime time.

Start times are designed to maximize the number of viewers in prime time across the time zones. The math is, more people are going to be watching the end of the game between 11 p.m. and midnight Eastern, the end of which is 12/11/10/9 o'clock across the time zones, than would be watching the beginning of the game between 7 and 8 p.m. Eastern if they started it early enough for kids to watch. The beginning would 7/6/5/4. That's how I understand it, anyway.

As you say about kids becoming fans, I think this policy is probably short-sighted. Then again, who's to say those kids would watch anyway? A bird in the hand and all that.

And I'm not the first person to say that if you don't like how late ballgames start and end, move west.