(If you're looking for a "Dancing With the Stars" recap, it's below this one.)

The gnats at Jacobs Field on Friday had people from NPR to Sporting News Radio looking at it as divine retribution against the Yankees. Which tells you something about the way the Yankees are viewed in most parts of the world.
But hey, one guy's plague is another's opportunity, as I explain after the jump …

This is from a piece I've written to run in the Beacon Journal sometime in the next couple of days:
All right, Indians fans, which plague do we use next?
The biblical descent of flying creatures on Friday certainly made the Yankees cringe. But the Indians are not done, so let's not put away our Old Testaments yet.
There are 10 plagues of Egypt, and Friday's bugs could actually count as three — gnats, flies and locusts. The Yankees certainly made it sound as if they had encountered some triple-threat disaster.
As Ryan Garko said, "The other guys were acting like bullets were flying at them."
Hey, they're from the Bronx. Bullets would be routine.
Of the remaining plagues, one — the death of the first-born — is too harsh no matter how much you love the Indians. But that still leaves six other possibilities.
Water to Blood. Suppose that the ballpark beer suddenly went blood-red. Not exactly appetizing. Take away liquid courage, and the opposing fans will have less reason to cheer — especially in Jacobs Field. Of course, Indians' fans may not imbibe either, but they're hardy stock. They can actually get excited by what's happening on the field.
And, to make it worse, throw in the plague of frogs — with them chanting "Bud"-"Weis"-"Er," just to remind the brew-deprived what they're missing.
Thunder and Hail. This being Northeast Ohio, rotten weather is always a possibility. Those of us still repairing hail damage from summer's storm wouldn't at all mind seeing players from out of town get a pelting. See how much they cry about that.
Darkness. The Yankees were apparently not the only team dealing with some divine intervention during the playoffs. Consider this Associated Press description of the third Rockies-Phillies game: "A cold front hit the stadium just moments before the Rockies took the field, dropping the temperature 15 degrees into the lower 60s, with gusty winds stirring dust and trash around the stadium. The eerie level went up another notch one pitch into the second inning, when the lights went out and cameras started flashing around the stadium."
That was in the Rockies' park. And you know who won that series. So how about some creepy atmosphere in the Jake? Hail optional.
Boils. And you can guess where we'd love to see those appear. No sitting in the dugout, thank you very much.
Diseased Livestock. Now, why does that make me think of Jason Giambi?

That's the end of that piece. But let me also address some of the folks who have called about my Sunday column on TBS and Indians-Yankees. Several readers thought it was a review of coverage, and said I failed to comment enough on the announcers' seeming bias toward the Yankees.

In my piece, I did throw in one Chip Caray line from Friday that was badly pro-Yankee (and wrong), but the piece was not meant to be a review of coverage. Instead, the assignment as given was to explain how a telecast worked — the meetings, the preparation, the hand signals, the adjustments to the unexpected. So that's what I concentrated on.

Still, while the telecasts included some props for the Indians, there were times it skewed Yankee. The third game, which took place after my piece ran, seemed especially pro-pinstripes; my Indians-loving bride was snarling through quite a bit of the early coverage that night. That could be the subject of another piece down the road. It wasn't the aim of the Sunday column.

The "Saturday Night Live" announcement follows the jump.

He knows comedy: LBJ at the ESPYs

Fresh off its recent Emmy wins, NBC's "Saturday Night Live" returns for its 33rd season on September 29 (11:30 p.m. – 1:00 a.m. ET) for three consecutive shows with a diverse and star-studded line-up.

Making their fifth appearance, musical guest Foo Fighters will perform from their sixth studio release "Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace." Its first single "The Pretender" has garnered early praise as "explosive" (Billboard) and a "super-rock torpedo" (Rolling Stone). Foo Fighters are among an elite group of American bands in the SoundScan era (Dave Matthews Band, Pearl Jam, Green Day, Korn, System of a Down) whose first five major label studio records exceeded platinum. With "Echoes," their sixth, and most ambitious, the Foos are poised to make history.

If CBS had sent out the first episode of "Kid Nation" for review, it would have muted some of the debate about the show. Obviously, CBS did not want to mute the debate … (some spoilers after the jump)

The controversy probably increased curiosity about the show, which premiered last night. It had gotten a lot of advance noise concerning whether the children on the show had been treated properly, whether laws had been circumvented, whether manipulation was the order of the day.

I think we're all cynical enough to recognize that manipulation is part of most reality shows. The bride and I watched the premiere of "America's Next Top Model" last night, and it feels thoroughly manipulative. We still watch, of course, but at least there are no illusions.

"Kid Nation," though, felt even more exploitative because its main characters are so young and so seemingly in difficulty.

But, based on the premiere telecast, the show's makers recognize that kids have to be treated differently. In the first challenge, for example, it not only rewarded the individual teams, it included a group reward so even the last-place team could make a contribution to the group's overall success; that meant that even the last-place team was cheered on by the other kids. And the gold-star, $20,000 reward is certainly a good way to keep the contestants wanting to achieve, instead of backbiting. I even liked the way the kid who dropped out was praised as he departed.

That said, it's still a reality show. Conflict will happen, and we've seen arguments — not to mention the notorious Blue Team Chalk Raid! — with more promised in the promo for next week. And it is eerie at times to hear young people talking as if they have listened very closely to the players on "Survivor." But even as things seemed on the verge of collapse, the kids found a way to get back together. And if the first episode is indicative of what's ahead, "Kid Nation" may prove that young people are better at living together than their adult reality-TV counterparts.

I don't know if I will watch again, but I won't mind doing so. But one of the things working against my watching is CBS's manipulating not the kids, but the audience. As I said, it could have calmed the waters just by making the premiere more widely available. Instead, it took the publicity.

"Sopranos" Folks at the Emmys (AP Photo)

Here's the word from HBO Video:

HBO's Emmy, Golden Globe and Peabody-winning series The Sopranos returns with the final nine episodes on all three DVD formats from HBO Video on October 23, 2007. In The Sopranos: Season 6, Part II, the show comes to its conclusion with Tony Soprano facing new stresses, including life-altering decisions at home, pressure from the law, and doubts about allegiances on the job that leave not even his oldest and most trusted crew members above suspicion. The Sopranos: Season 6, Part II, available on DVD, HD DVD and Blu-Ray disc formats, is being released in time for the holiday season, making it the perfect gift for die-hard fans. …

"Making Cleaver," an exclusive sneak-peek at the behind-the-scenes making of the film that Christopher pitched in Hollywood
"Music of The Sopranos," a retrospective look at the final season and the music that helped shape it
Four audio commentaries from cast members – Episode 1: Steven Schirripa, Episode 3: Dominic Chianese, Episode 7: Robert Iler, Episode 8: Steven Van Zandt

Pricing: $99.98 DVD, $129.95 HD DVD/Blu-Ray

For those of you who have not yet found it online, my fall-season rumination is here. (The first line in text is actually a subhead, with the story beginning on the following line.)

But, even as we all get psyched about the TV season to varying degrees, there are still those who view TV as an entertainment stepchild to the movies. I am thinking specifically of Gregory Kirschling of Entertainment Weekly, who wrote a recent article about writer-director Paul Haggis ("The Great Divider," Sept. 21 issue).

Paul Haggis, movie guy — and TV guy

Even though the piece focuses on Haggis's movie work, I was still taken aback by this passage:

Haggis burst on the scene three years ago with his script for Clint Eastwood's "Million Dollar Baby." A former "Facts of Life" writer who'd left a 25-year career in TV to pursue film …"