Matt Cain, who has been a civilian much of this year for the San Francisco Giants, was at the back of the team's 11th champagne party in 48 months, standing next to Madison Bumgarner but taking it all in nonetheless from a safe and dry distance. So when he was asked the one obligatory question of the evening – "Can you explain the winning run of this game for your children when the time comes?" – he half-smiled and said, "No. "I'm watching like you are. But I can't explain the third run. Or the first two runs either." In other words, he got one of the two right answers to explain San Francisco's series-clinching 3-2 victory over the Washington Nationals. In the National League Division Series. [RELATED: Instant Replay: Giants finish off Nationals, advance to NLCS ] The other, of course, is "Somehow this is who we are, and somehow this is what we do. Beats the hell out of me." How the Giants beat the Nationals in the four games and 16 hours of this series are a tale in and of itself, with each game getting progressively weirder. If there is an overarching lesson to be pulled from the series as a whole, it is only that pre-series analysis is a hot steaming torrent of...