San Francisco Giants: 5 Key September Series That Could Seal Their Fate

The San Francisco Giants have struggled mightily since the All Star break to do anything at all offensive.  August cannot come to an end soon enough for the Giants who have experienced offensive ineptitude as well as more injuries to key players than one team can seemingly handle.

If the Giants can get healthy relatively quickly then there will be some critical series' coming up throughout September.  Entering play on Monday night the Giants stood four games behind division leading Arizona so every series is important.

Here are five specific series that could end up being the one that seals the Giants fate.

San Francisco vs Arizona in SF

The San Francisco Giants open the final month of the regular season with a three-game series at home against the team directly in front of them in the standings, the Arizona Diamondbacks. The series will be from 9/2-9/4.

The Giants finish up August at home with three games against the Chicago Cubs while Arizona does so with three at home against the Colorado Rockies.  The Giants are facing a four-game deficit as they start their series against Chicago and they can no longer afford to tiptoe through games.

If the Giants can overcome Monday night's dud and get some help from Colorado they could be in a position to control their own destiny come Friday night.

The Giants will have to take significant steps toward offensive improvement as they leave August behind them, and hope for continued strong pitching from their top three starters.  They will have Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum and Ryan Volgelsong starting against the D-Backs.

San Francisco vs Los Angeles in SF

The Dodgers have gone through a pretty horrendous season from their ownership situation to their results on the field.

The Dodgers do have a lot of very talented players and if the rivalry still means anything in LA, the Dodgers will be playing to ruin the Giants chances.

Unless the Giants have somehow found a solution for their inability to score, the Dodgers could give them fits.  This series is from 9/9-9/11.  It's a series that a championship caliber team will win.

San Francisco vs Los Angeles in LA

If things have gone the Giants way then this series in Los Angeles could be bigger than the previous meeting between these two teams.

As was the case in the previous slide, the Giants will have to play solid baseball, pitch well, and not make any mistakes.  If this series is important, the Giants will be in a position where they can't afford to lose and will be scoreboard watching. 

The fact that they are playing their rivals on the road will make things that much more difficult.  This series could be the end of the season for the Giants if they aren't able to overcome many challenges.  This series is from 9/20-9/22.

San Francisco vs Arizona in Arizona

At this point, the Giants can only hope that this series still has meaning as they arrive for the final meeting between the two teams on the season.

If Arizona has stumbled a little while San Francisco has turned things around, this could be the series where the NL West is won.  If the games do matter, it should prove to be an exciting, well fought series.  The way things look as August closes, this is a long shot to be the series that seals the Giants' fate.  This series is from 9/23-9/25.

San Francisco vs Colorado in SF

This is the final series of the regular season.  It is from 9/26-9/28.  If this is the series that ultimately decides the Giants 2011 fate, then a lot of trends were broken in September.

Giants' fans remember vividly how torturous and exciting it is to have the season the come down to the final three games, and then the final game of the season.  Many said it was too much to take, but I am willing to bet that if given the chance, they'd all take a similar situation this year.

If the series in the previous slide was a long shot, this one is a pipe dream, but it's baseball...stranger things have happened!