Beards of Fury

Ever since catching fire late in the season and blowing right by my fading San Diego Padres, the San Francisco Giants have been on a complete tear. After beating the Padres on the final day of the regular season to clinch the National League West and advance to the National League Divisional Series versus the Atlanta Braves, the Giants have gone an impressive 9-3 in the postseason. In the NLDS they ousted the retiring Bobby Cox and his Atlanta Braves in a series headlined by great pitching and close, one run games. Then, against the heavily favored Phillies, late season waiver wire pickup Cody Ross went into the stratosphere, powering the offense to defeats of Roy Halladay, Cole Hamels, and even Roy Oswalt (in a bullpen appearance).

San Francisco's much unheralded offensive lineup must have been waiting for the postseason to catch up to the best all-around pitching staff in baseball, and they have done just that. The pitching staff has continued to be fantastic in the postseason, beginning with Tim Lincecum and the rest of the starters and ending with LSU Alumnus Brian Wilson who has an invisible 0.00 ERA and 5 saves. The coupling of these two entities has produced a seemingly unbeatable team of destiny. In game one of the World Series, ace Tim Lincecum was faced with the daunting task of defeating the Texas Ranger's stellar ace, Cliff Lee. After falling behind in the early innings Lincecum stabilized and left in the sixth inning with an 8-4 lead. The Giants and Rangers equaled runs in the last three inning producing an 11-7 final. Many saw this game as a fluke and figured that the Ranger's powerful bats would get to the Giants in game two. The opposite happened. Giants' pitcher Matt Cain silenced Texas's offense for zero runs on four hits, and the Giants' hitters erupted to produce nine runs.

With the Giants clicking on all cyclinders and the Rangers struggling to do much of anything this series is in trouble of concluding prematurely. If anything, fans of the Rangers must hold solace in the fact that they get three games at home starting Saturday, and can virtually turn this series into a two game affair if they win all three. The game on Saturday will be the first World Series game ever hosted by the Rangers, and you can expect their fans to be out in full force.

This series is certainly not over until the Rangers drop a game at home, because they will not win two games in a raucous San Francisco-if it even gets that far. All I know is that this powerful, fearsome lineup with so many dangerous hitters will not simply roll over and die. This team will begin to hit and pitch, but it could turn out to be a case of too little too late.