You dig to get the dirt on Rogers, and you still come up empty

"That's called a sinker," Rogers cracked. "And that's called a change-up.

"The ball was doing funny things because I sink it and cut it. I got away with a few mistakes tonight. I throw balls that move. If I throw them straight, they go 550 feet most of the time."

Funny thing is, just after he pitched the first, Van Slyke and third baseman Brandon Inge approached him in the dugout and had an animated conversation. It was then that Rogers disappeared from the dugout -- and returned with a cleaner hand.

The assumption is that after the television cameras caught Rogers, both the Cardinals and the Tigers spun into action. The Tigers being especially proactive to tell Rogers, quick, you were on TV, get that stuff off of your hands.

That dugout conversation between Van Slyke, Inge and Rogers?

"I don't remember it," Van Slyke said, after visibly squirming for several seconds. "And if I did, I wouldn't tell you."

Then he offered a prediction: "The media for the next 24 hours won't be talking about anything else -- Carlos Guillen (who has reached base in seven of eight plate appearances during the World Series), Kenny Rogers -- and if they do, it will be in the context of what was on his hand or what wasn't. And that's not fair to Kenny Rogers or to the Detroit Tigers.

"Whatever it was, it's irrelevant because he shut out the Cardinals. He gave up two hits."

Rogers, undressing alone at his locker long after most of his teammates had showered and headed toward the bus that would take them to their middle-of-the-night charter flight to St. Louis, smiled and shrugged.

"Hey," he said. "It gives you all something to talk about."