In the end, it really wasn’t that much of a contest. Behind the pitching of righty ace Tim Lincecum and the long ball hitting of veteran shortstop (and series MVP) Edgar Renteria, the San Francisco Giants won the 106th Fall Classic — downing the Texas Rangers 3-1 in the fifth game of the World Series and taking the series four games to one. That the difference was pitching should not come as a surprise. The Giants rode the arms of their best pitchers, while beating Texas ace Cliff Lee twice. Giants’ starters held the hit-heavy Rangers’ line-up to an embarrassingly anemic .167 batting average, with the Rangers’ best hitters unable to unlock the Giants’ best starters. After scoring seven runs in the first game against the Giants, Texas’ bats went quiet in the Fall Classic’s final four games, scoring just five runs in the final 36 innings of the series. “As a competitor, you want to put it on yourself,” Texas third sacker Michael Young said during post-game interviews in the Rangers’ clubhouse. “They threw the ball well, but no matter who is out there, we still feel we’re capable of scoring runs. We just didn’t get it done.”

The same message was given by patch-em-up and let-em-play veteran Edgar Renteria, who manfully stop-gapped the Giants at shortstop, while providing a home run bat that had been silent nearly all season. The crafty and savvy shortstop walked away from the 106th World Series with the MVP, a much deserved reward for a player who spent the year nursing an aching neck and all sorts of tears and pulls to compile a .412 (7 for 17, two home runs, six RBIs) Fall Classic. Renteria, 34 — and in his fifteenth season — hit a three run dinger in the fifth game to notch his place in Giants’ (and baseball) history. “I got confident, looking for one pitch, and if he throws it I’m going to hit it back to the middle,” Renteria said of his home run stroke against Texas ace Cliff Lee. “So he tried to throw the cutter, and the cutter stayed in the middle, and that’s why it went out.” That Renteria would be the player at the center of the Giants’ postgame celebration seemed oddly just: a legendary franchise that boasts some of the greatest players in baseball history now has a new hero — a slap-and-run good-glove defender who plays quietly behind, argubly, the very best pitching staff in baseball. That’s what made the San Franciso Giants the Champions of the World.

It’s hard to believe, but the San Francisco Giants last won the World Series in 1954 — back when they were the New York “Baseball” Giants and their move west to “Frisco” was still a dream. 1954? Hmmm. Let’s see: that was six decades and two generations ago, long enough for San Francisco fans to give up hope that they would fly an orange-and-black championship flag from the wind-blown ramparts of A.T.&T Park. It’s a sign of the franchise’s futility (perhaps), that its greatest moment came on October 3, 1951, when Bobby Thomson’s ninth inning “shot heard round the world” put them into the World Series against the Yankees — which they then promptly lost. Put more simply: the New York Giants have five world championships, the San Francisco Giants have none.

The drought is a surprise, considering the team’s storied history and legendary players. Juan Marichal and Orlando Cepeda never won a championship in San Francisco, nor did Willie Mays or Willie McCovey, or the Alou brothers (Jesus, Matty or Felipe) — or Barry Bonds or Gaylord Perry. The “storied franchise” is not so storied after all: for while San Francisco has had a gaggle of great teams and great players, the brass ring always seemed to elude them. They came within an out of a championship in 1962, were crushed by the A’s in 1989 and lost it by a whisker in 2002. But back in New York, in 1954, the Giants fielded a team that was the best in baseball — and one that destroyed the Cleveland Indians in four memorable championship games. And while barrels of ink have been spilled on Willie’s miraculous catch off the bat of Vic Wertz in Game 1 of that series in the Polo Grounds, the real hero of the Gothams that year was lefty Johnny Antonelli — a kid with a hemi for a heater and a chip on his shoulder.

That we remember Mays, and not Antonelli, is not a surprise. The kid from Rochester, New York was then one of the most disliked players in the game. A “bonus baby” signee of the Boston Braves and a malcontent who never thought he got enough credit, Antonelli was resented by his teammates for the reported $50,000 he was given by Braves owner Lou Perini for signing with the club in 1948 — some $20,000 more than Braves’ ace Johnny Sain was earning. Sain was so upset that he threatened to walk out on the club, until Perini gave him a raise. Never mind: in their 1948 race to the pennant, Antonelli sat the bench and was given the silent treatment from his teammates. When it came time to split up their World Series’ shares, the Braves voted the batboys $380 — while Antonelli got nothing. The next year was only marginally better for the southpaw, who saw little action, and in 1951 Antonelli left the team to spend two years in the army. It was a relief.

Antonelli returned to the Braves in 1953 and pitched solidly (he was 12-12 with a 3.18 ERA), but the team was in Milwaukee and the owners were tired of the bonus baby controversy, so they shipped him to New York — for the iconic Thomson. It was another piece of bad news for Antonelli, who had to fill the shoes of a saint, but the Giants’ front office knew what they were doing: Antonelli completed a front-line rotation that included Sal “The Barber” Maglie and Ruben Gomez — and was the last piece of the Giants pitching puzzle. And Antonelli, castigated for never living up to his bonus baby potential, turned into the Giants’ ace, going 21-7 and compiling an impressive 2.30 ERA. He won the Sporting News Pitcher of the Year Award and, to cap it all off, pitched the Giants to a win in game two of the series — and registered an improbable save in game four.

The Giants’ victory in ’54 was the highlight of Antonelli’s career. He was good in ’55, but not great, and solid in ’56 and ’57 and ’58. But in 1959 (and as if he intended to show up his detractors), Antonelli returned to form, winning 19 games for a Giants’ team that lacked the defense of its 1954 predecessor. Still . . . San Francisco fans had never warmed to Antonelli and he fought with them in the pages of the city’s papers. He hated playing in Seals Stadium, where the wind played havoc with southpaw pitchers and he said so. One morning, Giants fans awoke to read the headline in The Chronicle: “Antonelli Criticizes Wind.” From that moment on, Antonelli and the team’s sportwriters fought a series of skirmishes that left Antonelli embittered against the city and its fans. By September he was being regularly booed by Giants’ rooters and he imploded. He was demoted to the bullpen (which he resented) and by the end of the season the Giants were shopping Antonelli in the American League. Before the 1960 season he was shipped to Cleveland.

Johnny Antonelli never regained the form that had made him a great pitcher in 1954, never salvaged a career with so much promise, never seemed to fit in in San Francisco. He was “a New Yorker on the wrong coast.” Cleveland’s owners thought a change of scene could help Antonelli — and provide the Indians with the southpaw they desperately needed. But Antonelli was so embittered by his San Francisco experience that he seemed indifferent to any help: by mid-season he was 0-4 with the Indians and, at the age of 31, he was dealt back to the Braves and then shipped to the expansion New York Mets. He never reported. “I quit baseball because I didn’t like traveling,” he told a reporter in 2007. “Not for any other reason. I had no injuries or anything. I’d had my fill of traveling. I had a business to fall back on or else I would have played longer, I’m sure.” Sure, but he once told a fellow player that his experience with San Francisco sportswriters so alienated him from baseball that he simply lost his desire to play the game.

We’re left with this. The San Francisco Giants, self-exiled from the Polo Grounds — remembered in history as the rivals of the legendary crosstown “bums” — have yet to reward their fans with a championship, have yet to bring a World Series flag streaming into The Bay. The team of Mays and Maglie and McCovey, of the “Baby Bull” and now “The Freak,” remain searchers in their return to greatness. San Francisco fans are left with a distant, fading and ultimately unsatisfactory memory — that in 1954, two generations and a coast away, southpaw Johnny Antonelli led his team into the World Series against the Indians and won it all. It was the last time the Giants ruled the world.

(above: Giants’ ace Sal Maglie is hugged by Johnny Antonelli after the youthful southpaw shut down the Indians in the final game of the 1954 World Series)

It’s possible to pitch to Albert Pujols — but you do so at your peril. Scott Olsen knew this of course (every major league pitcher knows it), but that didn’t keep him from missing an up-and-in pitch to the St. Louis powerhouse, who promptly deposited it in the left field seats. That was home run number 35 in the slugger’s season, a plus-30 total that he has now reached in each of the last ten seasons. The Pujols’ dinger (number 401 of his career, after he hit number 400 on Thursday) was not the difference in the Cardinals’ 4-2 victory on Friday night, but on a day that saw Washington’s top pitching prospect announce that he would undergo Tommy John surgery, the appearance of Prince Albert at Nationals Park might prove reason enough for Nats fans to make the trek to Half Street.

How good is Pujols? A 2008 manager’s survey named him as the most feared hitter in baseball — and for good reason. The slugger’s numbers draw comparisons to Willie Mays, Ted Williams, Stan Musial, Mel Ott, Frank Robinson, Babe Ruth — and Lou Gehrig. The Gehrig comparison seems appropriate: both Pujols and Gehrig won one batting title when they were under 30, and Gehrig stroked thirty home runs and hit over .300 for nine consecutive seasons — a mark broken by Pujols last year. In truth, Prince Albert has already matched Gehrig’s greatness (a claim that is heresy in New York), for while Gehrig was an RBI machine (175 in 1927, 184 in 1931), Pujols is arguably the better slugger: Gehrig stroked over 40 home runs five times in his 17 year career, while Pujols has hit over 40 six times in ten years. If Pujols stays health, he’ll add to that record next year and quite possibly for many years after. Additionally, Pujols’ slugging numbers are breathtaking: he has led the league four times in ten seasons, Gehrig did it twice.

Stan “The Man” Musial remains the most iconic Cardinal (as Pujols readily admits), but he never had Pujols’ power (Musial stroked 475 home runs in 22 seasons, Pujols has hit 401 in ten), or his RBI potential — Musial had ten seasons of plus-100 RBIs, which Pujols has already equaled. But what Musial lacked in power he made up for in hits: he led the N.L. in hits in six seasons, Pujols has led his league once. Pujols’ power is Willie Mays’ power: Mays hit 40-plus home runs six times in 22 years, Pujols has done it five times in ten. Pujols’ strike out rate compares favorably with Henry Aaron’s and his power is similar. Aaron hit 30-plus home runs in 15 of his 22 seasons, a mark that Pujols could equal (with that important caveat — if he stays healthy) in five years. And Pujols hits for a higher average.

While feeding a comparison compulsion is a pastime for baseball fanatics, it has its rewards — it compels us to understand just how great the truly great were: Ted Williams led the majors in walks six times, Pujols has never done it once, though Pujols will undoubtedly eclipse Williams’ RBI totals. Then too, while pitchers fear Pujols, they were petrified by Williams (who led the A.L in walks eight times); that, or Williams had the better eye (or both). But Pujols (on the other hand) has a much better eye than Frank Robinson, who sported high OBPs — but absolutely hated to walk. Robinson won the MVP twice, Pujols has done it three times. Mel Ott (underrated and below-the-radar Mel Ott) was a horse, playing and playing and playing without injury year after year. Pujols will outhit Ott, but he’ll have to stay healthy to equal his total games mark. Oh, and Ott knew how to walk and (arguably) had a better eye at the plate. But just barely. And while Pujols does not have the power of Barry Bonds, he could add something (and this year) that Bonds never had — a Triple Crown.

So while Nats fans justly mourn the loss of a potentially great pitcher (and a pitcher for the Washington Nationals, no less), they might take modest solace that — at least when the St. Louis Cardinals visit D.C. — they can watch one of the very greatest players who ever played the game. Pujols is so good that he is not only drawing comparisons to Ruth and Gehrig and Musial and Williams (and maybe half-a-dozen others), he has already equaled or surpassed many of their more celebrated stats. Albert Pujols is already the Lou Gehrig of St. Louis and he already has Hall of Fame numbers — and he’s only getting started.

Bobby Thomson hit “the shot heard round the world.” Thomson’s walk off home run came at precisely 3:58 pm, New York time, on October 3, 1951 — and is considered the most dramatic moment in baseball history. Thomson’s bottom of the 9th shot came off  Brooklyn Dodgers’ right hander Ralph Branca with two men on. With the Dodgers leading 4-2, Branca threw Thomson a first pitch fastball over the center of the plate. The next pitch was inside and high and Thomson swung. The hit was not a towering fly ball, but a line drive that sailed into the left field seats of the lower deck in the Polo Grounds. It gave the New York Giants a 5-4 win and the N.L. Pennant, two games to one. The two teams had finished the season with identical 96-58 records. The Giants had taken the first of the three game playoff series (3-1) and the Dodgers the second (10-0). Deadlocked at one game apiece, the third game would decide the pennant. What made Thomson’s home run even more dramatic is that the Giants had won 37 of their last 44 games to force the playoff, having trailed the Dodgers by 13 games in mid-August.

Also known as “The Miracle of Coogan’s Bluff,” Thomson’s home run is celebrated in the immortal broadcast of Russ Hodges that was heard on WMCA-AM radio — “The Voice of the New York Giants”: “There’s a long drive… it’s gonna be, I believe…The Giants Win The Pennant! The Giants Win The Pennant! The Giants Win The Pennant! The Giants Win The Pennant! Bobby Thomson hits into the lower deck of the left-field stands! The Giants win the pennant and they’re goin’ crazy, they’re goin’ crazy!”

For many years it was not known what happened to Thomson’s home run ball. While innumerable myths have surrounded its whereabouts (most recently in Don DeLillo’s Underworld), it is now believed that a Franciscan nun recovered the ball and kept it in a shoebox for fifty years. When she died, her sister collected the shoebox and deposited it in a landfill. Willie Mays, then 20, was on deck when Thomson hit his home run.

The New Rule: Taking advantage of a new Major League rule, the Washington Nationals are considering trading 1st Baseman Nick Johnson for “a player to be named much, much later.” While the Nats front office would not name the player, it is thought to be young Bobby Bailey, a T-baller with the Overland Park, Kansas T-ball league. Bailey is believed to be a prized prospect in the Kansas City Royals scouting system.”He’s an integral part of our decades-long effort to rebuild our team,” a Royals’ scout noted proudly. While only six years old, Bailey is viewed by the Nats as a potential future player whose upside is that “while we don’t know whether he can run, hit or catch, he never gets injured.” As one Nats insider told River-Dogz: “This kid is just a stud, he just rolls with the punches.”

Okay … well, heartless as this may seem, the truth of the situation is even more heartless. In many ways, Johnson was more valuable to the Nats than Ryan Zimmerman; he was a silent clubhouse presence who led by example. His second deck home run earlier this year was a sign of things to come — a prodigious shot. He’s gone for the remainder, after a wrist failed to heal. While “Meat Tray“ is a very fine . . .  yes, indeed a very fine hitter (and leader too), you can see why other teams pursue Johnson, while passing on his replacement. The front office quietly has it that Nick is snakebit. Maybe. But for pursuing scouts, anxious to land a leader and trade some prospects, Johnson appears fragile. There’s a world of difference.

This is a disaster. 

On another note: We mourn the passing of Ryan Langerhans to Triple A Columbus, where he will attempt to break out of his career-long slump. We have heard from sportswriters of the BBWA that the motion to change the phrase “Mendoza Line” to Langerhans Line has been tabled, pending the outcome of Pete Orr’s tenure as Langerhans’ replacement in the Nats’ lineup. We wish Ryan well. Everyone struggles in baseball, but he has struggled more than most.

The Grey Eagle: You can make the argument (you can make it, but you would lose) that Tris Speaker was the greatest center fielder of all time. That would place him ahead of Babe Ruth and Willie Mays, of course, and that’s not possible. But he’s certainly in the top five and perhaps in the top three. There’s a reason for that — and it had nothing to do with his deep friendship with that world-class chump, Ty Cobb. Speaker was the first in a long-line of unappreciated Red Sox: brilliant players who were eventually cast away for money or bums because the owner thought they were too expensive, washed up …  or just because.

The list includes Ruth, Fisk and Clemens. But Speaker was the first to go — and the worst decision in Red Sox history (yes, worse than Ruth because in Speaker at least they knew, yes the keepers of the asylum just knew), and Boston fans talked about it for years afterwards. Speaker went to Cleveland, of all places (in 1916), and for a few bucks and some prospects. That’ll show him!

So if Cincinnati is a place where pitchers go to die, then Boston is a place where great players go to get traded. Still.

Anyway. I was reading about Speaker the other day (there’s this) and I was just stunned by his statistics. Two in particular. The retro-sheets show that Speaker played so shallow in center field that he sometimes covered second during double plays: 6-8-3! He holds the record for double plays by an outfielder (139). Of course this was the dead ball era, but still. Then there’s this: in over 10,000 at bats he struck out 220 times.