Magic number is 176

(MCT) -- If the 2008 Democratic presidential race were a baseball season, Hillary Clinton would need the greatest comeback in major-league history to clinch the nomination. In a campaign that has been consumed by mathematical projections -- and admittedly overrun by sports metaphors -- that's perhaps the easiest way to understand the odds facing the New York senator who entered the campaign looking like a 1927 Yankees-style lock to carry the party banner in November. Clinton and rival Barack Obama have combined to secure about 88 percent of the available delegates in their nomination battle, the rough equivalent of playing 142 games in a 162-game baseball season. Obama is sitting in first place with a significant lead in delegates. But unli