By Morris Phillips

Buster Posey’s excellent sight line on history had him just 15 yards from teammate Pablo Sandoval camping under a foul pop hit by Salvador Perez, which would become the final out of the 110^th World Series.

Seeing what was about to transpire, a smile came over Posey’s face.  But he couldn’t help but sneaking a glance at Madison Bumgarner, whose perspective on history might have been just that much clearer.

The Giants built early 2-0 and 3-2 leads in Game 7 at Kauffman Stadium on Wednesday, and then essentially took a back seat as Bumgarner—with a huge assist from Jeremy Affeldt–hand delivered a third World Series title to San Francisco.

The World Series MVP entered a tense ball game in the fifth inning with the objective of maintaining a one-run lead for a couple of critical innings and never left.  Bumgarner, who had already won Games 1 and 5 as a starter, pitched five innings, retiring 15 of the 17 batters he faced to make the Giants World Champions for the third time in five years.

It was thought that Bumgarner would pitch a couple of innings and throw 50 pitches at most on just two days rest following his complete game, shutout performance on Sunday in San Francisco.  But after allowing a base hit to Omar Infante, the first batter he faced, Bumgarner retired 14 consecutive hitters before outfielder Gregor Blanco allowed Alex Gordon’s single to elude him and roll to the wall for a two-base error that put the tying run on third with two outs in the ninth inning.

But with the pressure of attempting to prevent the tying run, along with pieces of the post-season history Bumgarner had already established at stake, the Giants’ ace induced Perez to pop up to end the game.  In his history-making, five inning appearance, the 25-year old Bumgarner became the first pitcher to win twice in the World Series and make a Game 7 appearance of this length on two days rest since Sandy Koufax did it as a career-defining and career-ending feat 50 years ago.  Bumgarner also shattered the record for innings pitched in one post-season at 52 2/3, over four innings longer than the record established by Arizona’s Curt Shilling in 2001.

And most impressively, Bumgarner allowed just six runs in the post-season for an ERA of 1.03.  And in the World Series alone, Bumgarner has a 4-0 record in five appearances with an all-time low ERA of 0.25.   He became the first pitcher in more than 100 years to win two World Series starts and then pitch more than two innings in a Game 7 relief appearance on just two days rest.

“I was just thinking about getting outs, getting outs, until I couldn’t get them anymore and we needed someone else,” Bumgarner said.

“I just told him I just can’t believe what he accomplished through all this,” manager Bruce Bochy said.  “He’s such a humble guy, and we rode him pretty good.”

The Giants became the first team to win Game 7 on the road in a World Series since the Pirates did it in Baltimore in 1979.  It had been 35 years since a road team had pulled the feat and nine teams had tried and failed in that span, including the Giants most infamously in 2002 at Anaheim.  Amazingly, the Giants played like champions just 24 hours after they were shut out 10-0 in Game 6 with a chance to clinch the title.

But even more demons were excised: the Giants fell in Game 7 in their first World Series in San Francisco in 1962 when the last out was recorded off Willie McCovey’s bat with a runner in scoring position and the home team trailing by a run.  This time–after Gordon’s hit and Blanco’s error–the tying run was 90 feet away when Bumgarner threw his final pitch.

“It got stressful in a hurry,” Bumgarner recounted.  “I thought he was going to have a chance to catch it and but then I (saw) that he probably wasn’t when he started pulling up.  I don’t know if it took a funny bounce or whatever may have happened but I know Gordon could run a little bit and it’s a big outfield so I was wanting them to get it in a quickly as they could.”

Both managers promised quick hooks for starters 39- year old Tim Hudson and the Royals’ 35-year old Jeremy Guthrie if trouble arose, and the hook came quickly for Hudson, two outs into the second inning.  The Giants struck first in the top of the second, only to see Hudson allow three hits and two runs in the bottom of that frame.  Guthrie lasted to the fourth, when he allowed a pair of leadoff hits to Sandoval and Hunter Pence.  Brandon Belt’s sacrifice fly followed, allowing an alert Panda to move to third base with one out.

Manager Ned Yost then reached for reliever Kelvin Hererra, but Michael Morse spoiled his entrance with an RBI single to right.  Amazingly, with Kansas City’s Big Three on tap, along with Affeldt and Bumgarner, Morse’s RBI would stand as the game-winner even though it came in the fourth inning.

As impressive as Bumgarner was, Hererra, Wade Davis and Greg Holland may have been more so for Kansas City.  The trio allowed four hits and no walks while striking out nine to keep the Royals within a run.  But the Giants didn’t blink, especially with Bumgarner pitching, and Pence and Sandoval spearheading the offensive rallies.

Sandoval made history of his own by accumulating 26 hits in the post-season and hitting .366.  The Panda’s 26 hits established a new post-season record.  Pence hit over .400 in the Series and had 22 post-season hits.

“They played great baseball,” Yost said.  “It hurts.  To come as close as we came in a one-run game, and as magical as our run has been, to end up losing the ballgame by 90 feet is tough.  The hard part about this is that you work all year to climb to the top of the mountain, and then boom, you fall back and you got to start right back at the bottom next year.”

Affeldt was awarded the win by pitching 2 1/3 innings in relief of Hudson.  The former Royal gave up one hit and pitched his longest stint since 2012.