DJ Ninja: Wildcard Confusion. Aren't the Chisox currently the wildcard? In that case, the Twins are 8 1/2 games behind the wildcard leader and, thus, possibly quite screwed.

King: Yes. What's the confusion? Didn't I write that? I'm not seeing the error if there is one.

I think that DJ Ninja was confused when you wrote about how far the Twins are out of second place in the wild card race in the middle of that section.

This caused no shortage of controversy within India, which balked for years, but finally, in part due to adverse rulings by the WTO as a result of actions initiated by the U.S., India finally, in January 2005, amended its laws to respect process patents for drugs created after 1995.

I think that it should be "product patents" at the end of that sentence.

They want their husbands to share equally in all childcare responsibilities, but they also want to be the one, always, the children run to for comfort. I can attest: It is very strange to be a mother in a public setting and have your daughter fall, scrape her knee, and cry for daddy. People turn to look. They really do.

Uhm, people tend to turn and look when any child is screaming. I don't put much faith in perceived differences in how people are reacting to a screaming child. It seems more likely to me that people are reading their own insecurities into other people reactions.

When my kids get hurt they run for comfort to whomever is nearest. Don't people who worry about such things have anything better to do with their time?

King,

I think that you may have been a little harsh on Lee Smith.

Rivera is 78 behind Smith on the career saves list, and a million miles ahead of him in any other way you want to compare them. That's what the career saves list is worth.

I can think of several places where Smith comes out ahead. He was 6'6" 265 lbs in his playing days compare to Rivera's 6'4" 168 lbs. And Smith only pitched 8 innings for the Yankees, compared to Rivera's 800 plus.

Seriously though, I agree that the save is one of the most over-rated stats in sports. Furthermore, because of the divergent career paths good closers have taken life-time saves is a silly number. Most guys became relief pitchers when they couldn't hack as a starter. Closers tended to be relievers with a little harder stuff, and who got a decent advantage from never seeing the same batter twice per appearance.

Now pitchers are groomed earlier to be closers and there is less prestige difference between a closer and a starter.

So Lee Smith was a bit of an anomaly. He had an unusually long career as a closer. He had some very good years, and some poor ones due at least partially to injuries. After another 20 years of pitchers who spend almost their entire careers as closers gets through baseball, I will be surprised if Lee Smith is still in the top ten for career saves.

I have a bit of a soft sport for Lee Smith, which relates to an early brush with fame I had. I went to grade school with one of Bruce Sutters' sons. I didn't get along with son, so I was glad when he was traded for Leon Durham. Of course that left a huge whole in the Cub's bullpen, which wasn't really filled until Lee Smith grew into the closer role a couple of years later. So I am forever in debt to Lee Smith for letting me be happy with that trade.

King, do you have a link to the actual ratings numbers anywhere? All I can find online are stories and blogs that refer to a NY Times article from July 7 - http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20F17FE3B540C748CDDAE0894DE404482.

I am not surprised that ratings have dropped, but I bet they are better for the last week than the previous week. Too many flat stages and no team tim trial that first week.

Anyway, I guess the coverage is down of the Tour is down in the US, but I am sure it is still much better than the pre-Lance coverage. My local paper has an AP story on page 5 of the sport section every day. The Tour is probably getting about half the space that the World Cup got, which isn't bad considering.

Personally I have watched every stage, though with TiVo remote in hand. I am enjoying the Tour more this year because everything is up in the air. I admit that Lance converted me to a fan of bike racing, not just of Lance, which is not true of most Americans.

PaulC, I think that you are too hard on the reaction to the current Spanish doping investigation. The teams themselves, not an outside governing body, decided to pull all riders whose names where mention in the Spanish government investigation because they didn't want to taint the entire race. I think it would have been foolish to let Urlich and the other ride because then the story through the entitre racing would have been "When is the hammer going to come down?"

I don't think that cycling and soccer fans are really much likelier to be snooty, but we probably are a bit more defensive and isolated. If listen to any spors call in shows you will hear a lot of crazy ball and stick fans as well. Fringe sports fans turn up more on the internet, and we respond to articles in disproportionate numbers.

Heck, during the World Cup there were baseball fans complaining in this space that King wasn't covering enough baseball. And King covers baeball like crazy! My guess would be that theonly sport that rivals baseball for space in this column is NFL football.