The Dodgers can clinch, and the Giants shouldn't let them

Oh, what could have been. This should have been the best Giants/Dodgers series since both teams moved west. It's so rare that they finish one-two. This could have been magic. Or a tomb of eternal horrors. But it could have been magic, too.

Pick your woulda shoulda couldas about this series. Unless the Giants make it past the play-in game, I'll forever lament the Rockies series from May. Because you weren't feeling bad enough about local sports:

_{Via FanGraphs}

Three straight games with a win expectancy over 95 percent against a team that's won literally 20 games -- 20 games -- on the road this season. All blown. The Giants would like those three games back. Can we have them back, Rockies? Please?

Eh, those three games cost them the #1 pick next year. Think of it that way.

If the Giants aren't jerks in those games, this is a tight race. A series win would have put them a half-game back. A sweep a game-and-a-half ahead. Those would have been good times. Instead, here are the scenarios:

Giants swept
They watch the Dodgers clinch.

Giants win one game
They watch the Dodgers clinch.

Giants win two games
The Dodgers clinch a tie in the division, with the Giants needing to sweep the Padres at home and the Rockies needing to sweep the series at Dodger Stadium. Which ...

Giants sweep
Giants move 1½ back, and in order to force a tie, they would need either to a) sweep the Padres and have the Rockies win a game, b) take three of four from the Padres with the Rockies winning two games, or c) split against the Padres and have the Rockies sweep.

Again. That's if they sweep the Dodgers.

Beating Kershaw.

_{(Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)}

Getting help from the Rockies.

Beating Kershaw.

_{(Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)}

Getting help from the Rockies.

Beating Kershaw.

_{(Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)}

Getting help from the Rockies.

Technically it's possible, I suppose. I wonder what the odds are for the Giants to win the West compared to the odds of them coming back against both Cincinnati and St. Louis in 2012, for example. Pretty low, I'd gather. It's rarer for Pablo Sandoval to hit for the cycle than it would be for the Giants to go 6-1 and the Dodgers go 1-5 over the last week, yet we've seen that, too.

Beating Kershaw.

_{(Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)}

Getting help from the ... you get the point.

I'm so disgusted with how this all played out. What about that Reds series in San Francisco? What about the 17-22 record in one-run losses? What about that Padres series that literally just happened. Remember that? Remember that Padres series? What if the Giants had won some of those games? That would have made this series a whole lot more interesting.

Instead, the Giants need a sweep on the road and they need help from the Rockies if they're going to win the division. Seems unlikely.

But possible.

I mean, I guess it's still possible.

Hey, yeah, dammit, it's possible. IT'S POSSIBLE. STOP LOOKING SO GLUM.

The Giants are going to knock Kershaw around, getting two or even three runs, and they're going to sweep. The Rockies will shut the Dodgers down in at least one game, and the Giants will sweep the Padres. Yeah, yeah, you see where I'm going. This isn't front-of-the-Times stuff. It's possible. It's absolutely possible.

Just don't think about how it's just about as likely for the Brewers to mow through the Reds and Cubs at the same time the Giants are playing like nincompoops, and you'll be fine.

Pitcher to watch

If the Giants can't beat Dan Haren on Monday, not only do they make it so the Dodgers are exceptionally likely to clinch at home, but they're automatically eliminated from the wild card because of Rule 3.38 (a), which explicitly states that a team that can't beat Dan Haren to save their divisional chances is disqualified from alternate routes to the playoffs. So watch out for that.

Hitter to watch

Steve Finley. Or, rather, the person who embodies the crusty, man-buzzard spirit of Finley. Go through the roster and pick the worst player to hit a walk-off to clinch the division. Is that person worse than Finley?

Puig? Nah. He'd probably eat his bat as he ran around the bases -- like, literally bite chunks out of the bat and swallow them. He's not at Finley levels yet.

Kemp? He's obnoxious, sure. But he's no Finley.

Hanley? Getting closer. See the above, with more adjectives in front of "obnoxious." In about three or four years, it's possible that Hanley is at Finley levels. Not yet, though.

Uribe? Oh, no, let me think about that. Gonna say no. Still painful, very painful, but at least we could rock back and forth and think about his opposite-field homer and game-winning sac fly in the 2010 NLCS.

The only person who could hit a division-winning home run that would be worse than Finley would be Brian Wilson. That's it. That's the only way. So we have that going for us. High-five.

My suggestion is this, then: The Giants shouldn't lose a game this series. It's the only way to be sure.

Prediction

The Giants lose a game this series. My personal hope is that they don't lose two, which would allow the Dodgers to jump around a lot.