Sometimes the tenor of a baseball game comes through in the opening moments. But of course, the gorgeous paradox that keeps us flocking to the TV for ninth inning after ninth inning, is the impossibility attached to actually identifying that tenor in the moment.

On Monday, the San Francisco Giants fell behind the Arizona Diamondbacks early, using a plethora of their old tricks from the summer of doom: uncharacteristically poor command on the mound, irreconcilable errors in the field, and too many strikeouts in the box. But the Giant not only won that game, but did so in blowout fashion. Whatever meaning you attached to the opening innings had vanished by the time the high-five line took place, and even in hindsight, you’re not entirely sure when that occurred.

So when the Giants started

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