I’m going to rant and vent at the same time. Let’s call this… rent. I’m going to rent. Or… vant. Whatever, you get me (either way I’m coining both terms).

I love baseball. I love the San Francisco Giants. I love the San Francisco Giants broadcast team. They’re the best in the business, and it’s not even close. But probably the worst thing they ever came up with – and I guess I’ll be looking straight at you, Duane Kuiper – is the whole Torture movement. To his credit, it has caught on very well amongst all levels of Giants fans.

And for the record, I’m not mad at him. Nor do I dislike or hate him for starting the movement. As fans, however, we should have known better to support it and feed it the gasoline that led it to grow into the ugly wildfire it has become.

I’m not one of the supporters of the Torture label, not even a little, and nor will I ever be. I cringe when I hear it, and I frown when I read it throughout the news and social medias.

“Torture” came about in 2010, the year the Giants won their first World Series in San Francisco. It was birthed when the marriage of our great pitching and just-good-enough timely hitting won us so many close ballgames.

But we won. We. Won! That is what I will never completely understand. Why is that torture when we earned that W? I love it when the Giants win, regardless if it’s a 10-2 laugher or a 1-0 nail biter. A win is a win and it’s a great feeling. How did that become torture?!

And against all odds (surprise, surprise) we are back in the postseason, trying to pull together and play the best baseball we can play for one magical month. And, without a hitch, the torture label re-surfaces from thousands of fans.

The other day, we won the Wild Card game in Pittsburgh. We won again today against an extremely tough Washington Nationals team for Game 1 of the NLDS. I will question once again – why is this torture when we’re winning ballgames?

I’ve been watching Giants Baseball for as long as I can remember, and that only really means that I hold a lot of memories with this team. And I’m going to take this moment to share some of those with you. Maybe, just maybe, you begin to re-think what you understand as torture –

1989 – The Giants and the A’s square off in the infamous Battle of the Bay World Series. Earthquake aside, the Giants get swept, and it was never close. And Jose Canseco did us with a mullet. TORTURE.

1992 – The franchise is poised to leave San Francisco for Tampa Bay. It wasn’t until Peter Magowan and other friends with fat wallets save the team and stay in SF. That waiting period before that decision was made… TORTURE.

1993 – The Giants win 102 games and don’t even make the playoffs, because the Atlanta Braves won 103. TORTURE.

1994 – Will Clark signs with the Texas Rangers. He was and still is my favorite ballplayer of all time. And to see him don another uniform other than the Giants was too painful. So I also became a Rangers fan as well. Then baseball as a whole decided to go on strike. TORTURE.

1996 – A 94-loss season. TORTURE.

1997 – The Giants get swept in the NLDS against the Florida Marlins. TORTURE.

1998/1999 – Mediocre seasons with no playoff appearances. TORTURE.

2000 – The Giants get eliminated by the New York Mets in 4 games in the NLDS. And Mike Piazza did us with a mullet. TORTURE.

2001 – After clawing through injuries, the Giants come up short against the Arizona Diamondbacks and watch October baseball on their couches at home. TORTURE.

2002 – The Giants make their first World Series appearance since 1989 and lose in 7 games against the Anaheim Angels and a rally monkey. TORTURE.

2003 – We meet the Florida Marlins once more in the NLDS and we are eliminated in 4 games in bone-crushing fashion when, in the final play, JT Snow is out at the plate after a clean collision with Ivan Rodriguez, who was able to hold onto the baseball. TORTURE.

2004 – The Dodgers eliminate the Giants in playoff contention when Steve Finley hits a grand slam to seal our fate for October-less baseball. TORTURE.

2005/2006/2007/2008 – Four straight severely losing seasons. Emphasis on severe, and emphasis on emphasis. TORTURE, and emphasis on TORTURE.

2011 – A collision with Scott Cousins at the plate takes Buster Posey out for the season that could have ended his then young(er) career. TORTURE.

Seriously, people. If you’re a Giants fan, re-think what you call torture. If you truly believe that 2010, 2012, and the current 2014 are “torturous” seasons, you either have unattainable standards of a 162-0 season along with clean sweep of 11-0 in the playoffs, or you were given an antonym book by someone who lied to you and told you it was a dictionary.

I’ll let you borrow my 2002 World Series DVD if you need a reminder what real torture is.