"They'd probably finish fourth in either the National League East or the American League East," St. Louis Manager Whitey Herzog said of the 1987 Minnesota Twins, who finished atop the supposedly inferior AL West with a mediocre 85-77 record.

The Twins won their divisional crown despite compiling a 29-52 road mark during the '87 American League regular season. Furthermore, the Twins were victorious only nine times away from home after the All-Star Game and they played sub-.500 baseball overall (36-37) following the mid-summer classic.

Herzog's Cardinals, on the other hand, went 95-67 and ruled the roost in the NL East. And, as fate would have it, Herzog's club and Manager Tom Kelly's Twins wound up as opponents in the 84^th World Series.

While St. Louis entered the Series with manpower problems - slugger Jack Clark was disabled because of an ankle injury and a rib ailment would curtail Terry Pendleton's playing time - many so-called experts still favored the Cardinals because or their post-season experience, pitching depth, speed and year-long knack of overcoming injuries. The quality of the Cards' opposition and the presence of Herzog, acknowledged as perhaps the best manager in the game today, were additional factors.

The flip side of the Twins' road futility was the fact that Kelly's club was very good at home. Very, very good. It had posted the best home-field record in the major leagues in 1987, a sparkling 56-25 mark. And wouldn't you know it, the World Series would begin in the AL champion's home park and four games would be played at that site if the fall classic were to go the distance.

That site in '87 was the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, a baseball purist's nightmare with its Teflon roof, lightning and acoustical problems, artificial turf and trash-can lining serving as a right-field wall. Yes, for the first time, World Series games were to be played indoors.

While the cozy Metrodome couldn't hold long fly balls (the homer-happy Twins "have a very good ball club - in their park," Herzog said pointedly), it was very good at holding crowd noise. And the combination of Minnesota batting power and Minnesota fans' lung power set Herzog and the Cardinals on their collective ear in a hurry.

In the Series opener, Minnesota's Dan Gladden capped a seven-run fourth inning with a bases-loaded home run off reliever Bob Forsch and Steve Lombardozzi cracked a two-run homer against Forsch in the fifth. Frank Viola pitched five-hit ball over eight innings, and the Twins were off and running with a 10-1 victory.

The fourth inning proved the Cardinals' undoing again in Game 2. Randy Bush belted a two-run double and Tim Laudner contributed a two-run single - both blows came off starter Danny Cox - as the Twins erupted for six runs. Bert Blyleven worked seven innings and was and 8-4 winner for Minnesota, which got a bases-empty homer from Gary Gaetti in the second inning, a solo shot from Laudner in the sixth and vocal support from its fans throughout.

The speed-oriented Cardinals, confident they would prosper in their own, large ball park, make noise of their own after escaping the Metrodome din. They won games 3, 4, and 5 in St. Louis, where baseball is played outdoors (one plus for the purist) but on artificial surface and in such a roomy stadium that the game being played on the floor below often resembles a track meet (a couple of minuses for the purist).

In Game 3, Twins Manager Kelly excused rookie Les Straker after six innings of shutout pitching - Straker led, 1-0 - and turned things over to Juan Berenguer. The Cards hammered Berenguer for three runs and four hits in one-third inning, and St. Louis lefthander John Tudor emerged a 3-1 winner. The fourth game was a 1-1 tie in the fourth when Tom Lawless, who had only two hits all season and only one home run in a 215-game major league career, clubbed a three-run homer off Viola that sent the Cardinals winging to a 7-2 victory. And a Cox-Blyleven duel in Game 5 went St. Louis' way when Curt Ford snapped a scoreless tie with a two-run single in the sixth inning. An error by Twins shortstop Greg Gagne on the next play added a third run, and the Cards were en route to a 4-2 triumph.

Herzog's team was now within one victory of the Series crown, but to clinch it the Cards would have to score a breakthrough at the Metrodome.

Tommy Herr hit a first-inning homer for the Cardinals in Game 6 at Minneapolis, and the Cards built a 5-2 lead after 4¹⁄₂ innings. Tudor, who had made a strong comeback from an early-season leg fracture, seemed just the man to close it out for St. Louis - but it wasn't to be. Kirby Puckett started the Twins' fifth with a single, Gaetti doubled him home and Dony Baylor followed with a home run. The shell-shocked Cards were suddenly in a 5-5 standoff. And before the inning came to an end, Lombardozzi singles in the go-ahead run off reliever Rick Horton.

Things only got worse for the visitors as both the decibel level and the Twins' run total rose dramatically. With lefthanded-hitting Kent Hrbek coming up with the bases loaded, and two out in the Twins' sixth, Herzog removed righthander Forsch and brought in lefthander Ken Dayley. Hrbek walloped Dayley's first pitch over the center-field fence. The grand slam made it 10-5 Minnesota. It wound up 11-5.

First-game pitching rivals Viola and Joe Magrane (a rookie) were paired together again in Game 7, which evolved into such an outstanding game that everyone forgot - if only temporarily - just where all this great baseball was being played. After Tony Peña and Steve Lake singled home Cardinal runs in the second inning at the Metrodome, St. Louis left fielder Vince Coleman threw out two runners at the plate - Baylor in the second inning and Gaetti in the fifth - to keep the National Leaguers in business.

Catcher Lake, who had held the ball despite being crashed into by Gaetti, had made another key play earlier in the fifth, nailing Puckett when the Twins' star tried to advance from second to third after a Cox pitch bounced in front of the plate. Despite the Cards' stellar defensive work, Minnesota nevertheless had forged a 2-2 tie on Lombardozzi's second-inning RBI single and Puckett's run-scoring double three innings later.

After the Twins loaded the bases in the sixth with three walks (two of which were yielded by losing pitcher Cox), Gagne hit a two-out grounder down the third-base line that went for a tie-breaking base hit when Lawless was unable to throw him out. And Gladden rapped an eighth-inning RBI double that pushed Minnesota's lead to 4-2 in a game that had few misplays of any kind (unless you count blown calls by umpires, mistakes that occurred with unusual frequency and were caught by the television cameras).

Viola had pitched well through eight innings, allowing only six hits, walking no one and striking out seven. But Kelly went to relief ace Jeff Reardon to open the ninth, and Reardon responded with a 1-2-3 inning.

In the first Series featuring home-field victories throughout, the Minnesota Twins won out. Maybe, as Herzog suggested, Minnesota wouldn't have finished higher than fourth if forced to compete season-long in the East Division of either league.

While Herzog dealt in what if, the 1987 Twins were content to bask in what was. And they were AL West titlists, American League pennant-winners and World Series champions.