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SPEAKER: There will be a special marching band centennial concert tomorrow afternoon, 3 o'clock in Northrop Auditorium. Not only will the marching band and alumni members be performing, but there will be guest appearances by the University of Minnesota alumni directors as well. You can contact Northrop Auditorium if you'd like some more information on that.

Also in sports, the World Series. The Twins are down now three games to two in the World Series. They lost three straight in Atlanta. Game six tonight at the Metrodome. Game time is 7:26. Scott Eriksson will be going up against rookie Steve Avery, who did quite well his first time out in game three, retired 15 straight Twins. Weekend edition sports commentator Jay Weiner here now. And Jay, I don't think anybody expected the Twins to lose three straight at Atlanta.

JAY WEINER: Sure. But first, what do you mean also in sports? Is there anything else going on in sports? I would say that people supposed, as the Twins did when they went to Toronto, that they could at least pull one win off on the road. I'm fascinated by the emphasis really on this home field advantage. And I think that the factor of the dome itself that is a covered stadium makes people be able to see that, obviously, one field is inside and one field is outside. But historically, through the World Series and in fact, the Twins World Series of '65 is a case in point.

People have always analyzed the effects of the physical conditions of the field. In '65, the Dodgers had the hard infield, the fast team, the overpowering pitching, the Twins had the power, the mushy field, the little dampness that seemed to have been there all the time, even though it was wet in the fall. And so this year, there's just been the overemphasis on it and the fact that both teams do so well at home. And actually, both teams haven't been bad road teams either.

I suspect that Game. six will be one again in which the dome comes into play. And if there's any poetic justice really, and not David Justice, but real artistic justice, we'll get to game seven and the season will have played out the ride that baseball aficionados enjoy, which is just coming to the culmination of what is it now 175 games in which two teams have done their best and are celebrating really the undulating terrain, I guess, of a baseball season.

SPEAKER: Do you think that Twins fans have approached the fact, confronted the reality that the Twins could lose?

JAY WEINER: Absolutely not.

[CHUCKLES]

I've really been struck by the almost football-like mentality that's been superimposed on this World Series. The purple blues that have been here in the Twin Cities for the last 30 years when the Pro Football team drops a game seems to have attached itself to the Twins. And I think in some ways, it's too bad really. Not to be an apologist for the Twins nor for the Braves, but I really wonder what's wrong with losing this thing after you've come this far.

You've come from last to first. You've won, in the Twins case, a playoff series against a team that some people thought was better in five games. And now you've done as well as you can maybe with a sore armed pitcher who's going to go tonight, Scott Erickson, and with a batting order that has lost one of its top hitters when you're in the other team's park because of the DH rule, with Kent Hrbek and Kirby Puckett your two big boppers really stinking out the joint and suddenly you're still at game six of the World Series.

And there should be a certain level of sophistication, which I think actually has emerged during the series from Twins fans. Instead of them cheering and waving their hankies constantly and on cue, they've seemed to have done it at the right times. I just don't think that people should be checking their windows to see if they can open at certain times.

SPEAKER: Well, in the political drama that is being played out in the tomahawk chop drama, it seems that the Twins are taking the higher road or getting more sympathetic treatment in some of the national press that's going around.

JAY WEINER: Well, I would say that more than the Twins getting sympathetic treatment, the Braves are being knocked for it. And among the fans, I don't think that sophistication that they're watching the game with has been transferred over to the politics of it. In fact, I think there's been, from my point of view, a sort of a fear of having to deal with the reality of the tomahawk chop as a legitimate offensive action.

And really people have downplayed it as some sort of giggly sports stuff. But you're right. I mean, if we want to be attached to something as silly as a homer hanky, that's fine. I'd rather be attached to something silly than something offensive. And yes, on the political side, the Twins are more progressive if you can call Ken Herbic progressive.

SPEAKER: You suggest what's to lose-- what's the big deal if we lose? I suggest to you that one of the major cereal manufacturers has promised to put either the homer hanky or a tomahawk in the hands of-- I think, it's Tony the Tiger for whatever team wins.

JAY WEINER: Well, for those players who have children, I'm sure that would be really a bad day. I think on the marketing side, the Twins, which is the one that I know more about, they have already, I'm sure, begun to cash in on the bonanza of tickets for next season. I know that they've begun to create a whole database system of reaching people who've bought playoff tickets in World Series tickets. And so obviously, if they win the World Series, that could mean maybe, I don't know, maybe 100,000 extra tickets.

But having gotten this far, I think that on the business side, they've already scored well. They would be remembered, obviously, as the team that lost the World Series that had the two to nothing lead that couldn't win on the road. And maybe like the north stars of the spring lose at home, which is really an unpleasant thing to see the other team celebrating, jumping up and down, and throwing water on their head while you're sitting there saying, gee, what the heck happened? But believe me, it won't be the end of the world.

SPEAKER: OK. You started a precedent last--

[INTERPOSING VOICES]

SPEAKER: I'd like to continue your precedent last week. Your prediction, sir?

JAY WEINER: My prediction is that by Monday, the season will be over.

SPEAKER: All right. You heard it here first. And next Saturday, we will wrap up the season. Yes, it could be worse. They could be the gopher football team who lost 52 to 6 to--

JAY WEINER: The band must not have been working very well.

SPEAKER: Jay Weiner is weekend edition sports commentator.