SAN FRANCISCO _ It will be a very pleasant good afternoon, and a wonderfully fitting one too: Vin Scully, calling his final game, with the playoffs on the line for his boyhood team.
After Scully delighted us with a career for the ages, the baseball gods have rewarded him with a finale for the ages. Some voices go hoarse without ever calling a clincher. In the final four games of his career, Scully could call two.
In his farewell game at Dodger Stadium, Scully called the game in which the Dodgers, his employers of 67 years, clinched the National League West.
On Sunday, his last day behind the microphone, Scully will call the game in which the San Francisco Giants could clinch a wild-card spot _ 80 years to the day after he says he walked past a laundry, saw the score of a World Series game in which the New York Giants had gotten pummeled, and declared his allegiance to the Giants.
"Wouldn't that be unbelievable?" Scully said late Saturday. "The whole idea is a fairy tale."
This year's Giants were left for dead, their obituary already written, held for publication until the final day of the season, when their collapse could be quantified. Instead, the Giants will report to the ballpark Sunday with suitcases in hand, and the guarantee that their season will extend beyond Sunday.
"No matter what, we're traveling," San Francisco Manager Bruce Bochy said, smiling broadly.
If the Giants lose and the St. Louis Cardinals win Sunday, the Giants fly to St. Louis for a Monday tiebreaker. Any other outcome, and the Giants fly to New York for the National League wild-card game Wednesday.
And what a marvelously ornery game that could be. For the Giants, Madison "Don't Look at Me" Bumgarner. For the Mets, Noah Syndergaard, who threw at Alcides Escobar in last year's World Series and dared the Kansas City Royals to do something about it.
This was how the Giants started their World Series run two years ago: Bumgarner, on the road, in the wild-card game.
Even-year magic? That was already on display Saturday, when a kid named Ty Blach earned his first major league victory, in his second start. Blach beat Clayton Kershaw and got two hits off him too, becoming the first Giants rookie to beat the Dodgers with at least eight scoreless innings since Dennis Cook in 1988.
That was the last year of Dodgers magic, the fall of '88.
Now Scully is 88, and one day from retirement. The Giants provided a golf cart and a police escort for Scully and his wife, Sandi, to use in navigating the crowded basement concourse after the game. Dodgers fans and Giants fans alike applauded as he passed, screamed their thanks, and hoisted their cell phones high to take pictures and videos.
At one point, Scully stopped to greet Buster Posey, the Giants' catcher. Before Saturday's game, in the broadcast booth, Scully had enjoyed a visit from Willie Mays. Posey said he might just stop by on Sunday.
"I'd like to run up and say hello," he said.
Beyond Sunday, Posey will play on. Scully will go home.
In 1951, Russ Hodges yelled, "The Giants win the pennant!" In 2016, Scully's final words could include these: "The Giants win the wild card!"
