The Cinderella Story: Is This The Year For The San Francisco Giants?

Could it be? Are the Giants the 2008 Tampa Bay Rays?

In many ways, the Giants are just like the Rays: the strong pitching staff, the scrappy offense that finds ways to win, the emergence of a young star Pablo Sandoval like Evan Longoria. This year's Cinderella story is finally making national headlines as they start to win and people all over are taking a liking to Sandoval. The lovable antics of "The Panda", always happy, joking around in the dugout, has drawn the eyes of Sports Illustrated. They will feature an article about Sandoval in the latest issue coming out Monday. The New York times has an article out about Sandoval as well.

Just think: Lincecum, Cain, Zito, and Sanchez in a series. Who wants to face that? Each pitcher has the ability to toss a shutout gem. Timmy, Cain, and Sanchez all have the ability to throw a no hitter.

In a seven game series, the Giants are a tough task. A tougher task though may be the Giants winning it all. With timely hitting and the trade deadline additions to the Giants offense however, they could go pretty deep.

If you look back at the last teams to win the World Series, they all got hot the month or two before the playoffs. The 2008 Phillies won their last 17 of 28, the 2007 Redsox won their last 17 of 27, the 2005 Whitesox won their last 17 of 29. Seems like 17 is the lucky number.

Right now the Giants have won 10 of 14 and are going home to play the struggling Reds. The Giants are neck and neck with the Rockies for the last playoff spot and they have three series left together, two of them in San Francisco. For this Cinderella story, we're just gonna have to wait through a wild August and September to see if the shoe fits.