It's a mystery to me too. The .327FM seems like the perfect J frame round. More powerful than a .38 Special with 1 more in the cylinder.

Seems like every LGS I go into has scads of .38 Special J frames right now. They are either moving a lot faster than it looks or (most likely) are not moving much at all. So the S&W folks might just be figuring there's not enough market for them.

Hard to get excited about a 7 shot L frame since 7 .357s fit just fine. If 7 fit in a K frame that could be an interesting special model but I doubt it would catch on with the mainstream.