Texas - The Texas Rangers have gone on the DL.

In baseball that usually refers to the disabled list. But considering that the Rangers were undone Sunday night by a two-run homer off the bat of Aubrey Huff, famed wearer of the Rally Thong, clearly the Rangers were Disabled by Lingerie.

Now the Giants (we're checking, this all might be a dream) are up 3-1 in the World Series and on the verge of bringing home the biggest party in the Bay Area since the Gold Rush.

The Giants' 4-0 win was another huge emotional U-turn in the Series. The Rangers won Saturday to recharge their hopes, but the Giants re-seized the emotional high ground on All Hallows Eve, by playing near-flawless hardball.

Huff's homer was all the help needed by Giants pitcher Madison ("I just pitch until they tell me I'm done") Bumgarner, who at 21, is only a few years removed from trick-or-treating.

Huff's Rally Thong, by the way, is more than just media candy or a passing fad. When I asked Huff after the game, in the interests of journalism, if he was still rocking the lucky garment, he jumped on the question like a belt-high fastball.

"Yeah, it hasn't left my body since we started playing (good ball), since 30 games (before the end of) the regular season," he said. "It's something you get quite used to after a while. I always wondered how women do it, but it's really not a big deal anymore."

But it's a lucky deal, and it brought good fortune to Bumgarner, whose story is right in line with the whole Giants-as-misfits theme. Mad-Bum, as they call him, didn't make the team out of spring training because he was out of shape from spending the offseason being just married.

He didn't get promoted from Fresno until late June, but pitched eight shutout innings Sunday, and has officially joined Tim Lincecum (tonight's starter) and Matt Cain to form the baddest mound threesome in baseball.

Going into this game, the deck seemed stacked against the lads.

There was a lurking belief that the Rangers were fated to win this Series because God would need to balance out the anguish inflicted on the good folk of Dallas and Texas in general by the Rangers' next-door neighbors, the Cowboys.

George W. Bush, former owner of the Rangers, threw out the ceremonial first pitch, and I think we all know how the ex-prez feels about San Francisco, which he sidestepped for eight years as president.

Worse, the Giants took the field with a makeshift lineup, bearing a whiff of desperation. Manager Bruce Bochy benched slugging left fielder Pat Burrell, mired in a horrendous slump. The game was in an American League park, bringing the designated hitter into play, but Bochy doesn't really have one.

So Bochy, who has had a Midas touch for the last month, sacrificed some much-needed potential pop by going to his bench for strong defensive guys, Nate Schierholtz and Travis Ishikawa.

No problemo. The Giants, typically, had heroes lining up in the dugout to take numbers, like at a deli counter. Huff's homer, for example, was set up by the professional-hitting heroics of Andres Torres and Freddy Sanchez. Leadoff man Torres led off that third inning with a double, one of his three hits on the night.

Sanchez then grounded out, but not before softening up pitcher Tommy Hunter by fouling off five consecutive two-strike pitches. That ain't easy. It was a fine piece of deliberate irritation that will long be admired wherever pesky hitters gather to talk ball.

By the way, if you're keeping score, Huff, Torres and Sanchez all fell into the Giants' starting lineup this season because, basically, nobody else really wanted them. OK, Huff had some market value, but he was so discouraged after a long career with losing teams that never sniffed playoffs that he almost retired before deciding to cast his lot with the Giants, who tried and failed to get three or four more attractive (talent-wise) guys to play first base.

Back then, the Rally Thong wasn't even a gleam in Huff's eye. But in September, he started parading around the clubhouse in it to diffuse any tension. Now he hands out copies to his teammates and even Bochy. And no, I didn't ask Bochy if he was wearing his.

The Giants are now 10-3 in their stunning postseason march, and Sunday's win, in true 2010 Giants signature fashion, was an ensemble piece.

Take Buster Posey, the rookie catcher from another world. Behind the plate, he masterfully handled fellow rookie Bumgarner (they broke in together two years ago in instructional league), and also gunned down Texas superstar Josh Hamilton trying to steal second, with a throw so accurate it would have stuck in Hamilton's hip pocket had not Sanchez gloved it.

Posey also launched a home run to deep center in the eighth, just after the Rangers brought in tricky sidearmer Darren O'Day.

Posey, good grief, is the first rookie catcher in the history of big-league baseball to bat cleanup in a postseason game, he's been doing it all month, and he's treating the big stage like it's Arizona fall ball.

Then, of course, there's Giants closer Brian Wilson. The Giants are weepingly happy that they have Wilson to close games, as he did Sunday with a 1-2-3 ninth (with two check-swing strikeouts).

But it's a shame that on Halloween night Wilson was away from the Bay Area, which, thanks to him, must have looked like a village of bearded kids on a sugar buzz.