E.K. NATION

That's how much ground the Astros have gained on the Cardinals in the last seven days: seven games. Barring doubleheaders, you can't gain seven games on an opponent any faster than that. And don't look now, but the Astros are just a game-and-a-half behind St. Louis now with six games left for the Cards and five left for Houston. So an exciting division race is going to happen after all in the N.L. Central. Houston finished 2004 on a 36-10 tear that effectively eliminated our Giants from the wild-card race. Are the 'Stros coming up with another great down-the-stretch run?

Forget any exciting down-the-stretch ball in the Junior Ciruit: The American League's Final Four is already set. New York Yankees, Detroit Tigers, Minnesota Twins, Oakland Athletics. So there's no real drama; it's just a matter of determining who plays who in the Divisional Series. In the previous set-up, the Yankees and Tigers would be tied for the East lead, and the A's and Twins would be separated by just a game-and-a-half. But forget that. Baseball fans got what they wanted: More teams in the playoffs. Ho-hum.

The National League group is not decided yet. The New York Mets are the only team that has clinched so far, doing so in, like, April. The Padres and Cardinals hold slight leads, and both divisions are contested by teams that could still wind-up in the wild card spot. Even the Reds are just two-and-a-half games out of first in the Central. We'll see how exciting the race for second place can be.

Barry Bonds Returning: Word is that Barry will come back and play in 2007, and his agent expects the Giants to want to bring him back. As this article states, it would be great for the Giants. We'd like to see Barry break Hank's record in a Giants' uniform, and the All-Star Game will be in San Francisco next year. It would be nice to have him around for that, if somehow he can make it to the team.

Stop punching each other, Ricky Bobby. Your "sport" sucks.

We're going to do all we can to ignore the wild card race and simply focus on the division title right now. The Giants are just three games back of the Dodgers. And even though the Padres are sandwiched in between, this is the N.L. West. A simple run of 10 wins and three losses could be all it takes to get into first place.

We haven't said anything about the 49ers yet. The 34-27 opening week loss to Arizona, while yecccchy and bleccchy when considering the standings, actually was a bit encouraging. After all, the Cardinals are supposed to be good (for Cardinal standards anyway), and for us to stay that close to them, yeah, we kind of liked it, as much as we can like any loss.

One thing's for sure, though, when you have a wide open interception opportunity and you blow it, like one 49er whose name we didn't catch (get it?) did, you're going to make us display some O-negative rage. Next play, Arizona got a first down on third down and very quickly scored the go-ahead touchdown. Which we knew was going to happen. That's just what it's like being a Niner fan these days.

It was good to see Vernon Davis catch a touchdown on his very first professional drive. And not so good to see he needs to learn to hold onto the ball. I don't like faulting a guy for fumbling while making the extra effort to get a couple of yards, but hang on to the rock, for the love of all things red and gold.

We're not gonna cave in.

The wild-card system still sucks.

Every once in a while, we take a look at what the standings would look like if the previous two-division-per-league-and-no-wild-card set-up were being used. Usually the results show the races would have been much more exciting with it. This year is no exception.

In the American League, the Yankees lead their division by 10 1/2 games, the A's by 5 1/2, and the Tigers by 1 1/2. The Tigers' division, however, contains the team that will most likely win the wild card spot, so that small lead isn't as dramatic as it might appear to unenlightened baseball fans.

In a pre-1994 baseball world, the Yankees would lead the Tigers by one game, and the Twins would lead the White Sox by 1 1/2 and the A's by 2. Winner goes to the playoffs, loser goes home. No cushion. Again, a reminder that the Red Sox/Yankees race of 1978 and the Braves/Giants race of 1993 would have been complete ho-hum borefests because both teams would have been assured of a playoff spot with plenty of time left in the season.

In the National League, the Mets are running away with the East, St. Louis has a 5-game lead on the Reds, and the Dodgers hold a 1-1/2 game lead over San Diego. But again, the Padres currently hold the wild-card lead. If this were 1993, the Mets would still be running away with it, but the Dodgers' 1-1/2 game lead would be the same, with the Giants 4 back and with an extra team, the Reds, thrown into the mix not too far behind them.

So, three of the four divisions in the prior set-up would be having great races right now, as opposed to the way it is now: Four teams have sizeable leads, and the two teams with small leads will likely see the team behind them make the playoffs as well.

So the "drama" is entirely confined to the two wild-card races this year. And there is a chance that the race for second place will be over before the final weekend starts.

Is that really what people still want? Is this better than the Braves/Giants race of 1993? No. It's not opinion; it is medical fact: It is not better than the 1993 race.

We here at E.K. Nation fail to see how the current system makes baseball more exciting. We don't even listen to arguments anymore. There isn't a convincing one in the bunch.

Turns out that The Next Pitcher To Throw A No-Hitter was some rookie we've never heard of, on the Marlins. That means Jon Lieber has retired from his post as E.K. Nation's Next Pitcher To Throw A No-Hitter after the shortest, and dare we say, most successful run that post has ever had. Meaning, he failed to throw a no-hitter just six times, which is way fewer than the other pitchers who have held that spot.

So...to continue in this really dumb exercise, we now appoint Tim Hudson of the Atlanta Braves to the post. Tim, you are on the clock, beginning with tonight's start against the Cubs. Get to it. You have work to do.

• Ummm, refs?...Ummm, there was a challenge flag thrown. Didja....didja just not, uh, see it? And Nick? Uh, Mr. Saban? Throw that thing. Fling it! Get their attention. Run onto the field and intercept the extra-point snap and run away with the ball! You just might prevent your team from losing a game!

• Nice work, Cal. We were looking forward to this season. Maybe you guys suck after all. Oh well, see ya in Corvallis in three weeks. We'll be the one guy in blue in a massive sea of orange and black. Find us and wave!

As we always do, we guarantee that these are our our predictions for the upcoming NFL season. We do not, however, guarantee that they will be correct. In fact, we are almost sure they will be wrong.

NATIONAL CONFERENCE:

THE DIVISION CHAMPIONS (in order of finish):

THE WILD CARDS:

NFC CHAMPIONSHIP GAME:

def.

AMERICAN CONFERENCE:

THE DIVISION CHAMPIONS:

THE WILD CARDS:

AFC CHAMPIONSHIP GAME:

def.

SUPER BOWL XLI:

17, 10.