Which reminds me. My dad and I went to see Bruce Springsteen in Milwaukee last week. It was a very good show, as one would expect from one of the great live performers of all time. My brief impression was that Bruce was much more attentive to his songs from “The Rising” than to the older material. Not that he gave “Badlands” or “Born to Run” short shrift, exactly, but I sensed that he wasn’t as interested in them as he was in the new stuff. Only natural, I suppose.

And I must compliment Bruce on the fact that even though we had terrible seats (way up, behind the stage), the acoustics were flawless and the huge video screens helped bring you into the show a little bit more. I don’t know if I’d make the drive again to see Springsteen, but it was cool to see a legend in person.

As with their show at Old Town a couple of years back, Iris DeMent made up for a lackluster opening set by doing a fine job on her duets with John Prine. While DeMent is blessed with a singularly interesting hillbilly-meets-hobo voice, she’s not much of a songwriter.

Aside from “Let the Mystery Be.” “Mama’s Opry” and a couple of other tunes, most of her songs, plodded along with little of interest melodically or lyrically.

John Prine’s songs, of course, sparkle with whimsy and heart. From old chestnuts like “Fish and Whistle” to haunting ’90s tunes like “Lake Marie,” Prine covered the gamut during his nearly two-hour show at the Symphony Center. Prine’s voice, always a gravelly thing, is even shakier now that he is two years on from surgery to remove a cancer from his throat.

But though he struggled to hit some of the notes on his own songs, the pauses he took to catch his breath made already haunting songs like “Angel From Montgomery” and “Hello in There” into devastating timepieces.

I felt lucky to be there. It’s hard to tell how much longer Prine can tour like this, with two young kids (who for a portion of the show were visible to the side of the stage) at home.But I was there last night, and I was very glad I was.

Phil Rogers says Bobby Valentine or Art Howe would be best to manage the Cubs, but I just don’t see why anyone with half a brain would want to come to the Cubs. A former Met manager in Chicago? Shudder.

And why on Earth are the Giants even thinking of letting Dusty Baker go (even if that means simply not offering him the kind of money he wants)? I just don’t get it.

That seems to the be the lesson of the division series. The A’s, understandably, went with a three-man rotation and it cost them. The Braves also started game-one pitcher Tom Glavine on three days’ rest and he got rocked again by the Giants. How will Milwood do on three days’ rest? It’s one thing if you’re like the D-Backs and have only Schilling and Johnson, and you know those guys are so great that they’ll win no matter how little rest they have.

But otherwise, why risk it? Especially when you could play as many as 19 games in the post-season? Going with a three-man rotation seems like a waste. Instead, it would be wiser to go with the four-man rotation and keep the No. 5 starter in the bullpen for long relief if the No. 4 starter really struggles. That’s the way to tighten up for these playoff series, not by running exhausted pitchers out to the mount to throw on three days’ rest.

And they did us all the favor of not dragging it out until the seventh game of the World Series like last year. The difference was simple: pitching. Anaheim hit .376 and averaged almost eight runs a game. And in crucial eighth-inning situations, Torre could not go to Rivera because of his arm troubles this year. The Angels are a great story, but so are the Twins.

First they defied Bud Selig, who wanted to contract them. Then they defied their owner, Carl Pohlad, who badly wants to sell them. And now they defied the odds, by beating a team with the best 1-2-3 starters in the major leagues and an A.L. record 20-game win streak this year. Odds should once again go against the Twins, though now they have the home-field advantage. The Angels are clearly the stronger team and also feel they have destiny on their side.

Now this kind of bursts my bubble, since I no longer have to root based on who has the best chance of beating the Yankees. So I can, without hesitation, root for the Giants to beat the Braves in game five (a tough task) and take on the Cardinals. Barry’s finally come through with a couple of home runs, though once again he’s been pretty much a non-factor, as those dingers came late in games in which the Giants trailed by large margins.

While we’re on the topic of these division series, the A’s and Yankees upsets illustrates one of the problems with the Wild Card. The first problem is that the division series are so rarely even close to competitive. But the second is that, in such a short series, it’s much too easy for a team to come in and beat a superior opponent just because one or two pitchers had a bad outing or someone got hot at the plate.

This is not to say that the Twins and Angels didn’t win fair and square — they did. And the “better team” doesn’t always win in the playoffs. But a five-game series is really not a good test of which team is better. If major-league baseball insists on having a division series and a wild card, the series should be seven games.