The Giants spent $200 million on payroll this year, which not only sounds like a lot — it is a lot.

On the other hand, the Dodgers, San Francisco’s archrival in the National League West, spent $300 million.

With San Francisco voters passing Proposition D Tuesday by an almost 3-1 count, the Giants might well have the leverage to erase that $100 million difference in the near future. The proposal allowed for a waiver of height restrictions in the area around AT&T Park, enabling the team to go ahead with their so-called Mission Rock proposal.

The club wants to build a high-rise district on a parking lot across from McCovey Cove behind the right field wall. The plans call for three towers that now can reach 240 feet in addition to homes, shops, offices, art studios, parks and a brewery, an area that Giants’ president Larry Baer told the Los Angeles Times will “have a Fenway feel, a Wrigleyville feel.”

And catching the Dodgers may not be the end. With sellouts in 408 consecutive games, the Giants already generate revenue in excess of every club in baseball other than the Yankees and the Dodgers. That will spike when the debt on AT&T Park is paid off down the line.

And while the Giants have won three of the last six World Series titles, Baer sees the Mission Rock project as a hedge against an inevitable downturn in on-field performance.

“The biggest single thing for us going forward is that we have a real estate project,” Baer said. “That is going to help us create a very important neighborhood around the ballpark and allow us to keep up with teams that are in larger markets.

“We can convert to 18 million homes for television like New York has, or 12 million homes like L.A. has. We’re at 7 million homes. To make up for the disparity, that is going to be one difference-maker for us.”

One more thing. The Giants may have sold every ticket at its disposal this year, but the Giants’ attendance was 400,000 behind the Dodgers, who don’t always sell out, but who always play in the park with the most seats in baseball.