It would have been a 15-yard penalty in the NFL for taunting. The unwritten rules of baseball has at least a full chapter devoted to showing up your opponent. In the NBA, such unsportsmanlike behavior would have led to a technical foul and ejection. The NHL would have sat the perpetrator down five minutes in the penalty box for misconduct. The guilty party: Dodgers manager Don Mattingly, who brought in Brian Wilson to toss the division-winning pitch against the Giants with a 9-1 lead. Wilson, once a revered Giant, burned his bridges and incinerated all the good will when he berated Giants President Larry Baer in a post-game, on-the-field tantrum in 2013 over why he hadn’t received his World Series ring. The Dodgers skipper had multiple pitching choices to officially close out the Giants and get the party going. Poor Don gets no respect against the Giants, as he is often rated as a second tier manager to the Giants Bruce Bochy. But by going with Wilson, Mattingly got the last laugh, at least for now.

Other thoughts on the night the Dodgers clinched:

FROZEN Ps: Buster Posey, Hunter Pence and Pablo  Sandoval have been referred to as the Killer Ps. In the last six games, with so much on the line, they have hit like frozen peas. Posey is four for 24 with no RBIs and no extra base hits; Pence is one for 25 with two RBIs and a homer; Pablo is four for 25 with no RBIs and no extra base hits. Together they are nine for 74. Their joint slump is why the Giants are having so much trouble even clinching a wild-card spot let alone home advantage in a wild-card do-or-die game. At the same time, their slump is the reason why you can’t count the Giants out because if they all come back to life at the same time, they can do post-season damage. Just ask the Reds, Cardinals and Tigers, the victims of the Giants bats in the 2012 post-season championship run.

REAL RIVALS: This Madison Bumgarner-Yasiel Puig feud is getting fun. And the best part: In these days of players jumping from club to club, the two combatants are likely to remain on their teams for some time. The pair had a nice dustup earlier this year when Puig homered against Bumgarner at AT&T Park. It was a two-fer for Puig as he flipped his bat and then did one of those “Chariots of Fire” impersonations as he ran the bases in slow motion. A steaming Bumgarner met him near home plate to voice his displeasure at the display. The adversaries had a rematch in this series when Bumgarner struck him in the lower leg, sparking an exchange of words that brought both teams onto the field. These two confrontations are still pretty tame when compared to clashes in the rivalry over the years, but it’s a start. I actually laugh at such incidents these days. If these big, strong athletes really wanted to fight, they could go one-on-one before anyone could stop it. Bumgarner didn’t throw his glove down and yell something like “let’s go” to Puig until 30 players, coaches and umpires were between them. The other comical part of these “brawls” is when the guys in the bullpen come sprinting toward the infield to join the fracas. You know that they probably have no idea what the beef is, but it’s mandatory to show you are backing your teammates.

CELEBRATIONS: Should the Giants have a champagne celebration and run around the field in front of adoring fans if they clinch a wild-card spot? The Pirates went full-champagne mode as if they had just won the World Series when they clinched a berth in the one-game wild-card match. That seemed a bit much to me and they might have paid the price as the celebrants lost the next day. The stumbling, fumbling Giants arrive home at AT&T after an embarrassing three-game sweep by San Diego and a dreadful 9-1 loss to allow the Dodgers to celebrate in front of them. They were outscored 31-12 in those two series. So if the Giants win, say Thursday, they should keep it low-key and get a good night’s sleep. They are playing for a wild-card home game, and they shouldn’t interrupt that quest with a champagne-swigging party. That’s for teams like the long-suffering Pirates, not the classy world champs of two of the last four years.

FREAK OUT? Did Tim Hudson’s performance Wednesday night against the Dodgers secure his place in the rotation? It wasn’t Kershaw-like, but it wasn’t a disaster, although he seems to be        about a five-inning pitcher at this point. Some, like me, wanted Tim Lincecum to get a shot at the Dodgers instead of the recently ineffective Hudson. Unless Lincecum gets a chance to start this final weekend against San Diego he might have to be a spectator in any post-season action.

BIG MAC AWARD: Clayton Kershaw won the prestigious Roy Campanella Award, given for team leadership. Madison Bumgarner should get the equally prestigious Willie Mac Award, named after Giants great Willie McCovey. Bumgarner’s all-out effort, dedicated approach to the game and success carry on the attributes of the legendary Giant. McCovey has been hospitalized with a serious infection, so I don’t know if he will be there to present the award. But I do know that it will be an extraordinary emotional night at AT&T.  I can’t be at the game, but I think I’ll make sure my treasured baseball that McCovey signed for me when I was a kid in 1960 will be front and center on my sports shelf in honor of this special man and great Giant. Get well, Willie.

NOT OVER: The odd thing about the Dodgers winning the division title against the Giants in this new wild-card era is that it doesn’t mean the Dodgers move on and the Giants go home. Assuming the Giants get to the wild-card game, and then win it, they could end up playing the Dodgers in either the National League division series or championship series. Maybe that helps explain the disturbing scene I saw Wednesday night when manager Bruce Bochy and other Giants coaches doffed their caps to the celebrating Dodgers from the dugout after the game. I’d like to think that rather than going soft against their long-hated rivals, Bochy and crew were softly humming the old Roy Rogers Show song, “Happy Trails to You, Until We Meet Again.

I’ve been one of those hedging about whether pitchers should win a Most Valuable Player award. They’ve already got the Cy Young award, and play only every fifth day, so the MVP should be just for everyday players, I reasoned. Then I watched Clayton Kershaw today as he pitched the Dodgers to a crucial 4-2 victory over the Giants at AT&T Park. Kershaw was in command in the 110-pitch performance, and mostly shut down the heart of the Giants order. This was a high-stakes rivalry game played on the big stage. A win for the Dodgers and they grab a solid three-game division lead with 13 to play. A loss and the Giants creep to within a game.

History is on Kershaw’s side in the MVP debate. The Giants and Dodgers had their first head-to-head, down-to-the-wire pennant race 90 years ago this month, in the 1924 season. The New York Giants clinched the flag on the next-to-last day of the season, but that didn’t prevent Brooklyn 28-game winner Dazzy Vance from winning the National League MVP. Vance, who struck out 262 while posting a 2.16 ERA, won it over St. Louis second baseman Rogers Hornsby, who batted .424. That average is outstanding, but Hornsby’s Cardinals were 68-89 and finished 28.5 games out of first, so Vance was deemed most valuable. Of course, there was no Cy Young award in those days, so maybe it made the selection of Vance even easier. One more argument in Kershaw’s favor: He is now 19-3, a phenomenal record especially in this day of limited starts and few complete games.

Other thoughts:

KOUFAX TERRITORY: Comparisons are being made of Kershaw and Dodgers great Sandy Koufax, who dazzled the game in the 1960s. It’s tough to compare pitchers from the two eras because of how pitching has changed. Starters work every fifth game now, while Koufax went every fourth day, and sometimes even less if needed. He even had three saves one year.

Koufax’s last four years, from 1963-1966, were his best, until he had to retire because of an aching elbow. During that stretch, he was 97-17, with 1,228 strikeouts, 150 starts and 89 complete games. His ERA s for the four years were 1.88, 1.74, 2.04 and 1.73. In the last four years, including this still unfinished season, Kershaw is 70-26 with 928 strikeouts, 124 starts and 16 complete games. His ERAs for these years are 2.28, 2.53, 1.83 and 1.67. Kershaw has won two Cy Youngs and is a cinch for a third this year. Koufax won three Cy Youngs, as well as an MVP in 1963. He had to beat out position players such as Hank Aaron, who hit 44 homers, drove in 130 and batted .319. Koufax pitched the Dodgers to the World Series that year while Aaron’s Braves finished 15 games out. Like Kershaw, he was usually rough on the Giants, including a no-hitter in 1963.

So is Kershaw approaching the status of the legendary Hall of Famer Koufax? It might not be a fair assessment, but those numbers above regarding complete games and starts just make it difficult to elevate a pitcher from this era of pitch counts to the level of those earlier workhorses. But that doesn’t mean I’m not in awe of Kershaw. And if I had a vote I would comfortably put his name on my MVP ballot.

CLINCHER: Here’s an extra incentive for the Giants, as if they need one, while they play Arizona and San Diego this week before heading down to Los Angeles on Sept. 22. If the Dodgers have a big week, and San Francisco stumbles, the Giants could face the danger of giving Los Angeles a chance to clinch the NL West crown in front of them.

SLOPPY: Kershaw wasn’t the only problem for the Giants in today’s loss to the Dodgers. On the big stage, the Giants forgot their lines and knocked over the scenery. They made two errors on one play, which led to two runs. Those came when right fielder Hunter Pence threw off line while trying to nail Hanley Ramirez at third. Giants pitcher Yusmeiro Petit retrieved the ball, but his throw to home to try to get Ramirez was wild. Petit  had only himself to blame for the debacle, because he failed to get to the right angle in backing up third. Petit also hurt his own cause when he failed to advance a runner in a bunt attempt. In the sixth, center fielder Angel Pagan misplayed an Adrian Gonzalez shot which turned into a double, and Matt Kemp followed that with a home run.

STREAKING: It’s hard to make a case for the Dodgers folding in these final two weeks. One of the strengths of the Dodgers is that they have enough pitching and offense to avoid big losing streaks. The Dodgers have had three three-game losing streaks this year. The Giants have had two-six-game losing streaks, a four and five game losing streak, and four three-game losing streaks. The Giants and Dodgers remaining schedules seem to be a wash. The Dodgers play six against Colorado, who they’ve beaten nine times out of 13. They meet the Cubs for four games in Chicago, and maybe there will some disadvantage in having the longer road trip. The Giants play seven against the Padres. They are just  6-6 against San Diego, so it seems against the odds to think that they would suddenly start dominating them.

ROUTS: The Dodgers 17-0 embarrassment of the Giants on Saturday night was the biggest victory margin in the rivalry’s West Coast history. Perhaps the Dodgers were just finally getting around to avenging their 18-run loss, 26-8, to the Giants in 1944.

The Giants and Dodgers franchises played their first-ever official game on Oct. 18, 1889. Could it be that 125 years later, on Oct. 18, 2014, the clubs meet in a seventh and deciding game in the National League Championship Series? It’s not a total stretch.

One of the teams will win the division title, and it seems likely that the other will play in the do-or-die wild-card game. If the Giants/Dodgers win the wild-card game to reach the five-game division series, the clubs would likely meet either St. Louis or Washington based on the current races. Assuming both were victorious, the Giants and Dodgers would play each other in the NLCS, and game seven, if necessary, would fall on and near the historic Oct. 18 date.

The Giants franchise, formed in 1883 in New York, and the Dodgers franchise, formed in 1884 in Brooklyn, began with the teams in different leagues, so it wasn’t until 1889 that both won their titles so they could meet in a best-of-11 championship series. Brooklyn took the opener 12-10, and built a 3-1 lead in the series, but New York then won five in a row to win the championship. One of the keys for New York is that they twice beat Brooklyn’s 40-game winner Don Caruthers and 22-game winner Adonis Terry, a workhorse who started five of the games.

NOTEBOOK

Price is wrong: The Giants will either be two or three games out going into this weekend’s three-game series against the Dodgers, based on the outcome of today’s Giants-D-Backs game. It will be interesting to see if Dodger Nation has a big presence at AT&T this weekend, as was the case when the clubs met in San Francisco in July. Giants management is to blame, as it jacked up prices for the games, which had the effect of making it attractive for its fans to profit by putting their seats on the market. The cheapest ticket for this series is $51.50 (Friday), $68.75 (Saturday) and $51.50 Sunday. That doesn’t even include those handling and convenience charges, and aren’t we thankful  that there are handlers who are so nice to make buying a ticket so convenient for us. The Dodgers, on the other hand, are making the Giants-Dodgers series at Dodger Stadium on Sept. 22-24 more conveniently affordable for their fans, with tickets as low as $25.

Mismatch?: The pitching matchup for the Giants-Dodgers finale of the three-game series Sunday looks like a mismatch — Clayton Kershaw vs. Yusmeiro Petit. I mean, how can poor Clayton compete with a guy who missed a perfect game by one out a year ago, set a major league record for consecutive outs this year and is coming off an 84-pitch complete-game shutout with nine strikeouts and no walks. Petit for MVP? While this is written in jest, who would have thought at the start of the year that a Kershaw-Petit matchup in a September Dodgers-Giants pennant battle would be one of the sexiest in baseball?

Wild card: Here’s an interesting decision the Giants might have to make. If they can’t chase the Dodgers down and win the West, they have a good chance to be the top-seeded wild-card team and host the win-or-go-home game against probably the Pirates, Brewers or Braves. Assuming the Giants hold on to their comfortable wild-card lead and clinch the spot early, they can set up their rotation as they wish for the wild-card elimination game and five-game division series against probably the Cardinals or Nationals. So who would pitch the wild-card game? Everyone’s first response would be Madison Bumgarner, but if that’s the case, and the Giants advance, he probably couldn’t pitch until game four. If the Giants were swept, that means their ace never got a shot. Sunday could be an audition for that wild-card game. If Petit can dominate on the big Dodgers-Giants stage by beating Kershaw and establishing himself as one of the hottest pitchers in the game, he might give manager Bruce Bochy all the confidence needed to give him the ball for the wild-card showdown. Another option would be to start Jake Peavy (I’d take him over Tim Hudson), with Petit in the wings ready to  step in at an early sign of trouble. I just think the Giants have enough, especially at home, to get past the wild-card game so Bumgarner can possibly go twice in the division series.

One of the marvels of the Giants-Dodgers rivalry in its more than 120-year history is that while the clubs have had only a handful of late season head-to-head pennant races, the rivalry still thrives. The teams are engaged in a high-stakes race for the flag now, though we’ll have to see how things shape up over the next two weeks before 2014 becomes a rare September to remember for the rivalry. The chase this year is for the NL West title, since the consolation prize will likely be a one-game do-or-die wild-card game that both teams wish to avoid.

How rare are these September showdowns?

The Giants and Dodgers franchises began regular season play in 1890, but it wasn’t until 1924 that they had their first down-to-the-wire battle. Brooklyn, which trailed first-place New York by 13 games on Aug. 9, went on a 24-4 run to tie the Giants for first on Sept. 4. Brooklyn slipped after that surge, but came back to gain a virtual tie with New York in the final week of the season. The Giants, propelled by a three-game sweep of Pittsburgh, clinched the pennant Sept. 27. It would be 15 years until Brooklyn would experience another late pennant race.

In the 56 years since coming to the West Coast, there have been just 10 seasons  which both clubs were involved in a September bid for the post season.

1959: A three-way pennant battle involved the Giants, Dodgers and the Braves, who were gunning for their third straight NL crown. On Sept. 19, as the Giants and Dodgers prepared for a crucial three-game series, first-place San Francisco led Los Angeles by a game and Milwaukee by 1-1/2. In the biggest series in the young West Coast rivalry, the Dodgers stunned the Giants with a three-game sweep. The Giants never recovered, and the season ended with the Dodgers and Braves in a tie. The Dodgers took the flag by defeating the Braves two games to none in a playoff. SPECIAL NOTE: The third game of that series against the Dodgers was the last game played at Seals Stadium, as the Giants would move into Candlestick Park in 1960.

1962: The Dodgers had a one-game lead with one to play, but were barely hanging on after losing nine of their last 12. The Giants forced a three-game playoff by beating Houston while the Dodgers fell to the Cardinals. The Giants outlasted the Dodgers in the playoff, winning the flag by rallying from a 4-2 deficit in the ninth inning of game three. SPECIAL NOTE: Sandy Koufax was sidelined for much of the stretch drive because of a circulatory disorder in the forefinger of his pitching hand. Older Dodger fans still swear that their team would have won the title outright had Koufax, who still went 14-7 with a 2.54 ERA, not gone down.

1965: The season always will be known as the one when Giants pitcher Juan Marichal put a gash on Dodgers catcher John Roseboro’s head in their infamous clash, but it also was a year of a red-hot pennant race. The Giants held the lead as late as Sept. 28, but they were sliding while the Dodgers were soaring. The Dodgers won 15 of their last 16 games to edge the Giants out by two games. SPECIAL NOTE: The Dodgers allowed only five runs in their last nine games while tossing five shutouts.

1966: Pittsburgh made it a three-team race for the NL title, and led the Giants by a half-game and the Dodgers by 1-1/2 in early September. The Dodgers tried to pull away with an eight-game winning streak. The Pirates faded but the Giants stayed close. The Dodgers needed to lose their final game to Philadelphia, which would have required the Giants to play a rain makeup game against Cincinnati for a shot at a tie. But the Dodgers got past Philadelphia to clinch the pennant. SPECIAL NOTE: During a tense August series, the Dodgers put on a shift to the right side with Willie McCovey at bat and Willie Mays at first. McCovey beat the shift with a run-scoring double to left, and the Giants went on to a big victory.

1971: Twenty years after Mays broke in during the legendary 1951 New York-Brooklyn pennant race, the clubs were again involved in a classic duel. The Giants led the Dodgers by eight games on Sept. 6, and had the chance to eliminate their foes in the five head-to-head matchups between then and Sept. 14. Los Angeles refused to blink and won all five hard-fought games. On the final day of the season, the Giants defeated the Pirates to win the flag. A loss would have forced a playoff with the Dodgers. SPECIAL NOTE: A Sept. 13 matchup turned ugly when Marichal and Dodgers pitcher Bill Singer engaged in a deck-the-batter exchange. After Marichal hit Bill Buckner, he headed toward the mound holding the bat up, evoking memories of the Marichal-Roseboro moment. Cooler heads rushed onto the field before Buckner and Marichal could tangle.

1978: The Giants rejoined the pennant race following a six-year hiatus, and led Cincinnati by a half-game and the Dodgers by 2-1/2 as San Francisco and Los Angeles prepared for home-and-away four game series over the next 11 days. The teams split the eight games, which was enough of a moral victory for the Giants to energize them for a September run. But the Dodgers were too strong, winning 30 of 40 from Aug. 5 through Sept. 16, and the Giants were eliminated on Sept. 23. SPECIAL NOTE: While this season might not qualify as a true deep-into-September race, it was a year when the rivalry had a revival. The fans certainly thought so, as the two August series drew 193,954 in San Francisco and 207,570 in Los Angeles.

1982: Never mind September showdowns. This battle went into October. The Giants and Dodgers went into their last head-to-head weekend series trailing first-place Atlanta by a game. Rick Monday single-handedly put the Giants’ hopes into the coffin in the opener with a tie-breaking grand slam, and the Dodgers used a team effort to add the nail in a 15-2 trashing the next day. The Giants’ Joe Morgan gained revenge the following day with a dramatic home run that ended the Dodgers’ quest and gave the pennant to the Braves. SPECIAL NOTE: Morgan’s heroics were no fluke. The veteran had a key role in five earlier Giants wins over the Dodgers this season.

1997: A two-team race. involving the Giants and Dodgers, had developed by mid-July with San Francisco holding a four-game lead. In most years, the teams might have at least another nine games against one another. But a scheduling shift starting in 1993 dramatically cut their head-to-head contests from 18 to 12 or 13. That left the teams with only one two-game series in San Francisco the rest of the way, which began with the Dodgers two games in front. The Giants won them both, highlighted by catcher Brian Johnson’s now famous 12th-inning walk-off homer for a 6-5 win on Sept. 18. The blast had the effect of sending the Dodgers on a tailspin and the Giants on a tear, with San Francisco clinching the crown on Sept. 27. SPECIAL NOTE: To this day, the Dodgers still can’t figure out how this one got away. In the  Sept. 18 game, they had the bases loaded and none out in the 10th but failed to score. Overall for the season, the Dodgers outhit the Giants .268 to .258 and outpitched them 3.62 ERA to 4.39.

2002: Arizona’s dominance had left the Giants and Dodgers having to battle for a wild card as the only road to the post season. The Giants held a one-game advantage in the wild-card race over the Dodgers on Sept. 15, and maintained the lead as the teams split a hard-fought four-game series. The Giants won their next eight straight , and clinched the wild card Sept. 28 though the Dodgers didn’t go quietly, winning six of their last nine games. SPECIAL NOTE: Rivalry gamesmanship was on display early in the season. The Giants opened at Dodger Stadium, and requested that the time of the final game of the three-game series be moved up so the team could get back to San Francisca earlier to get ready for its home opener the next day. The Dodgers declined.

2004: Post-season berths through a division title or wild card were both at stake in the final 10 days of the season, and the Giants and Dodgers would be meeting six times. The first-place Dodgers led the Giants in the division race by 1-1/2 games, while Chicago and Houston were contending for the wild card. The Dodgers took two out of three against the Giants Sept. 24-26, and led by three games heading into the final weekend’s three-game series against the Giants. The Giants won the first, but their post-season hopes crumbled the next day as Steve Finley’s grand slam in the ninth put them on the ropes. Houston supplied the knockout punch by clinching the wild card the next day while the Giants and Dodgers were playing, as Dodger Stadium fans cheered the demise of their rivals. SPECIAL NOTE: The Dodgers, having been pounded by Barry Bonds the previous few years, finally discovered that avoiding him was the best strategy. In the last six games between the clubs, Bonds walked 14 times and had only 10 official at bats.

Will 2014 join the list of classic Giants-Dodgers finishes?

The Dodgers lead the Giants in the division race by three games with 19 to play, and the teams will meet six times over the next 17 days. Another page of the 124-year-old rivalry awaits to be written.