NEW YORK (AP) – Faced with the extraordinarily popular baseball playoffs on Fox, rival networks have cried uncle and pulled several original series episodes for reruns.

CBS and NBC shelved new editions of “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” and “Friends” – television’s most popular drama and comedy – on Thursday because the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox were playing the deciding game of the American League championship.

A night earlier, NBC yanked “The West Wing” off its schedule, replacing it with a “Law & Order: Criminal Intent” rerun and no explanation to viewers.

Fox’s broadcast of the deciding game of the National League championship between the Florida Marlins and Chicago Cubs on Wednesday was seen by an estimated 26.5 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research. It was the highest-rated league championship game in at least 10 years.

“We’re all running into the buzz saw of baseball,” said CBS spokesman Chris Ender. “For all the talk of the Cubs and Red Sox being cursed, the broadcast networks are being cursed. This is clearly wreaking havoc with the rollout of our new season.”

Last week, all the broadcast networks – except for baseball-dominated Fox – had smaller audiences than the same week in 2002.

CBS planned an original episode of “Survivor” Thursday, followed by reruns of “CSI” and “Without a Trace.” NBC’s entire Thursday schedule was in reruns. ABC stuck with its schedule of original series.

Television networks generally have fewer original episodes of comedies and dramas than there are weeks in the TV season. Financially, it makes little sense for them to use those originals on nights when their ratings are clearly going to suffer.

The risk lies in alienating viewers who were just getting used to their favorite shows again after a summer of reruns.

NBC’s postponement of “The West Wing” Wednesday bewildered and angered many viewers.

The episode promoted for this week will be on next Wednesday, said NBC spokeswoman Rebecca Marks. “We are still giving viewers the opportunity to watch their shows,” she said. “For people who are torn, we feel like we are helping those viewers.”

CBS News also said it was replacing an original edition of “48 Hours Investigates” with a rerun on Saturday – when the World Series opens.

The postseason participation of the Cubs and Red Sox – two teams with large fan bases that haven’t won a World Series in nearly a century – is fueling the popularity of baseball this fall.

Interestingly, NBC is betting that the World Series will not be as popular as the playoffs, now that the Cubs are eliminated. NBC had been planning to air several reruns next week so as not to compete with the World Series, and now will replace them with originals.

Fox executives made no secret that they were openly rooting for the Cubs. The Cubs have more fans than the Marlins, and their long championship drought was a more compelling story for casual fans.

Researchers at Initiative Media estimated that a Cubs-Red Sox World Series would generate a 16.7 average TV rating, while a Marlins-Yankees World Series would only get a 12.4. That’s a difference of more than four million households tuning in or turning off, a significant impact on Fox’s business.

The Marlins have little following outside of Florida. Although the Yankees are in the nation’s largest media market, many viewers outside of New York are tired of the team because of its recent run of success, an Initiative analysis said.

AP-ES-10-16-03 1631EDT