WESTERVILLE, OHIO - OCTOBER 15: Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) looks on as South Bend, Indiana Mayor ... [+]

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With the World Series underway, what better time to revisit my favorite baseball film, Bull Durham, and one of its many great lines: "the moment's over."

Speaking of moments, South Bend Mayor and presidential hopeful Pete Buttigieg apparently is having one. This poll has him climbing into third place in Iowa, posing a threat to former Vice President Joe Biden and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

The significance of this poll, keeping in mind that political news can have a brief shelf-life these days (not long after Mayor Pete's Iowa surge merited a screaming headline atop The Drudge Report, it was relegated to the lower right side of Drudge's home page in favor of the Canadian election and Trump impeachment): rather than a binary choice between Biden and Warren, a third option may be emerging.

How this impacts the Democratic race:

Added Pressure On Warren. Her strategy is pretty straightforward: win the Iowa caucuses, slingshot into New Hampshire and win that primary eight days later, then the nomination is hers (since Jimmy Carter won Iowa in 1976, every Democrat who won those first two contests went on to become the party's nominee).

The fly in the Warren ointment: either losing outright in Iowa, or another Democrat "winning" the night by beating expectations (such as Gary Hart in 1984).

At present, Buttigieg poses that threat. Maybe that explains why Warren suddenly feels the need to trot out a set of numbers to prove that she can implement Medicare For All without sticking the middle class with the price tag - a point of contention between Warren and Buttigieg in the most recent Democratic presidential debate.

Added Pressure On Biden. That Iowa poll wasn't the only bit of bad news to cross the Biden transom. There's also a matter of money - specifically, Team Biden's lack of it (so much for Biggie Smalls' Mo Money Mo Problems playing at Biden rallies).

Biden's campaign finished the third-quarter of the fundraising year with $9 million in cash on hand. In Democratic circles, that's the other side of the tracks.

According to what the candidates shared with the FEC, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders had $33.7 million cash on hand, Warren had $25.7 million, Buttigieg $23.4 million and California Sen. Kamala Harris $10.5 million. Over a three-month stretch, Biden raised $15.7 million in individual contributions, versus $19.1 million, $24.6 million and $25.3 million for Buttigieg, Warren and Sanders, respectively.

In short, Biden's campaign needs to raise a mess of money - and in a hurry. That may explain why its messaging has drifted from the comfier concept of "electability" to such hot buttons as Facebook's platform.

Circle November 20 on your calendar: it's the scheduled date for the next Democratic presidential debate. With two debates slated after that before the Iowa caucuses, Biden's running out of chances to sparkle before a national audience.

What Clear Path? As mentioned earlier, the clearest path to the nomination is an Iowa-New Hampshire sweep (it worked for Carter, Al Gore and John Kerry).

But if the two states split, all bets are off.

Now, a little Democratic history in the modern age of primaries (for the sake of this argument, the elections since Carter diligently worked the backroads of Iowa and rewrote the campaign play book):

1984. Walter Mondale beats Gary Hart by almost 3-1 margin in Iowa, but Hart's surprise second-place finish makes him the night's big story. Eight days later, in New Hampshire, Hart tops Mondale be nearly 10 points.

The two candidates split six contents on March 13 th of that year. However, Mondale won four of the five remaining March contests and three of four in April. Despite Hart's spin that his appeal to newer, younger voters made him the better challenger to President Reagan, it was game over.

1988. Then-Rep. Richard Gephardt defeats former Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis by seven points in Iowa; Dukakis returns the favor in New Hampshire, coasting to a 17-point victory.

March 8 was the key date in that year's set of Democratic primaries and caucuses. Twenty-one states voted that day, with Dukakis winning nine. However, his campaign sold the press on a "bookend" strategy of winning Florida and Texas - evidence that the New Englander had southern appeal (1988 was the year of a Democratic obsession over Dixie - the national convention being held in Atlanta). With Florida and Texas in Dukakis' corner, the race is over.

1992. A strange year in that Bill Clinton manages win his party's nomination despite capturing 27.6% combined in Iowa and New Hampshire (2.8% in Iowa, where Clinton didn't participate; 24.8% in New Hampshire, good enough for a second-place finish). A small field absent a heavyweight rival afford Clinton that rare luxury.

Clinton won only one of seven states on March 3 of that year; a week later, he took seven of eight states - losing only Massachusetts to favorite son Paul Tsongas (the New Hampshire winner in 1992). After that's, it's a coast to the finish line for Clinton.

2000. Also a strange election for Democrats in that it's a binary choice (much like 2008 and 2016): Al Gore or then-New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley.

And stranger still: it's never much of a contest. Bradley fails to get within 12 points of Gore in Gallup Polls in the year leading up to the primaries. After a 26-point loss in Iowa, Bradley comes within four points of Gore in New Hampshire.

Otherwise, it's the rare case of a Democratic frontrunner going wire to wire - with hardly a fright.

2004. There's plenty of drama in the months leading up to the voting - Democrats playing a game of musical chairs with their frontrunners.

But once the voting begins, the drama ends. Kerry wins both Iowa and New Hampshire (fending off John Edwards in the former and Howard Dean in the latter).

Worth noting: only three Democrats had their tickets "punched" coming out of Iowa. A preview of what's in store for Democrats in 2020?

2008. Barack Obama wins Iowa, but loses New Hampshire. On that year's "Super Tuesday (Feb. 5), he takes 13 of 23 states (Hillary Clinton winning the biggest prizes - California and New York).

From there, Obama runs the table for the remainder of the month. It's not enough to put away Clinton, but it gives Obama momentum - and the slight edge - that he'll never cede.

2016. Hard to believe it was almost four years ago that Hillary Clinton wins Iowa by a scant 0.3%, gets clobbered in New Hampshire by almost 23%, then goes on to win eight of the 12 March 1 contests.

The race still has its twists and turns. Bernie Sanders pulls off a surprise in Michigan on March 8, then trounces Mrs. Clinton in Wisconsin a month later (a preview of trouble ahead for Hillary, come November). Five more Bernie wins in the second half of April adds more drama to the inevitable outcome.

And since Hillary Clinton is into Russian conspiracies these days, let's spend a moment on the inside job that haunts Sanders: delegates.

In 2016, the Democrats' final delegate count was 2,807 for Clinton and 1,894 for Sanders. That includes 602 "superdelegates" for Hillary; just 48 for Bernie.

What Sanders can't let go of: he doesn't get the Democratic nomination because he supplemented the 45.5% of delegates received via state votes with less than 1% of the available "superdelegates."

This is all a long-winded saying: should Buttigieg disrupt the Democrat race and Iowa and New Hampshire reach split verdicts, start looking at the calendar. And these dates:

March 3 - 16 primaries and caucuses (most notably, California and Texas);

March 10 - seven states voting (most notably, Michigan);

March 17 - four states voting (Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Ohio);

April 28 - six states voting (most notably, New York and Pennsylvania).

Or maybe someone sweeps Iowa and New Hampshire and we have to figure how to pass the time until mid-July and the convention.

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