The San Francisco Giants are a Major League Baseball team based in San Francisco, California that currently play in the National League West Division.

While seeking a new stadium to replace the crumbling Polo Grounds, the Giants began to contemplate a move from New York, initially considering Metropolitan Stadium in Minneapolis-St. Paul.

Despite objections from shareholders such as Joan Whitney Payson, majority owner Horace Stoneham entered into negotiations with San Francisco officials around the same time that Dodgers' owner Walter O'Malley was courting the city of Los Angeles.

New York would remain a one-team town with the New York Yankees until 1962 when Joan Whitney Payson founded the New York Mets and brought National League baseball back to the city.

In 2000, after 40 years at Candlestick Park, the Giants bid a bittersweet farewell to their old home and relocated to a new, privately financed downtown stadium, a long-advocated move.

Pacific Bell Park, later renamed SBC Park and then in February 2006 AT&T Park, sits on the shores of China Basin (often referred to as McCovey Cove by Giants fans) at the corner of 3rd and King Streets (with an official address of 24 Willie Mays Plaza to honor the long-time Giant).

The franchise since the move annually vies for highest MLB season attendance, in contrast to being often threatened with having the league-low figure before.

Despite inaugural game festivities for the San Francisco Giants at the new ballpark, the Dodgers would spoil the 2000 season opener, with a three HR performance by little-known Kevin Elster.

'09 San Francisco Giants