"But the Cubs will be the Cubs," the Chicago fan sighed. "Leon Durham couldn't get that grounder. Steve Garvey hit that homer. We lost three straight in San Diego. No pennant. No World Series. Nothing."

"None of it will matter if we win it all," he said. "We'll forget about the last 81 years. All will be forgiven."

"All will be forgiven." This is the message the fans are sending to the players as they cheer the first pitch today in Oakland and tomorrow in Chicago. All the losses, the errors and the failed attempts at the Heimlich maneuver will be erased from history. For one of the teams.

But for the other three, the nightmare will continue. No matter how precisely the A's marched through the summer, no matter how majestically Mitchell and Clark reigned over National League pitching, no matter how admirably Cito Gaston rescued the sinking Blue Jay ship, no matter how magically the Cubs warmed the hearts of baseball purists, something will happen to three of these teams over the next few weeks that will cause them to once again be branded as losers and chokers. Their accomplishments of 1989 will be forgotten. Their fans' laundry list of heartbreaking defeats will grow still longer.

That's baseball. Someone has to win, and someone has to lose.

Who made that rule, anyway?