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“The Dodgers are just another baseball team.”

The comment came courtesy of Giants relief pitcher Ryan Walker, who closed out Tuesday night’s 3-1 win over the reigning World Series champions at Oracle Park, tossing a perfect ninth inning and leaving the great Shohei Ohtani on deck as the game ended.

Walker, known for his deceiving delivery but not necessarily for having an outgoing personality, wasn’t trying to disrespect the Giants’ long-time rivals. Or provide bulletin-board fodder. He didn’t say it in a mean-spirited way. He wasn’t trying to ignite a brouhaha of words.

It was simply the latest example of the Giants showcasing their new fiery mentality under rookie manager Tony Vitello, upping the intensity level to gain a competitive edge that seems to lead to a better brand of ball. AKA TonyBall.

Walker’s full quote: “We’re out there to win. It doesn’t matter who we’re facing. The Dodgers are just another baseball team. You know what I’m saying? You go out there with the same mentality of like f-you, and you get the job done. You do your part. Everybody else does their part. You kind of hold the ground.”

The 10-13 Giants made a statement in the series opener that, no, they are not intimidated by the big, bad 16-7 Dodgers.

“Why would you be?” Walker said. “I don’t care who’s on the team. I don’t care who the team pays for. They’re all baseball players. When you start getting nervous about a team coming in, they’ve already beat you. So when the Dodgers come into town or we go to L.A., who cares? It’s another baseball team, and we have the same mindset of, like, we’re going to go out there and win.”

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Baseball’s oldest and most decorated rivalry (sorry, Yanks-Red Sox) is in town this week, and the Giants are desperately trying to play catch up with their nemesis. Or at least trying to compete. The rivalry has lost some of its luster of late because it has been so one-sided. From 2022 through 2025, the Dodgers dominated the Giants with a 40-18 record while outscoring them by 80 runs, and they won three of the past six World Series if we’re counting the abbreviated 2020 season.

Then came a cold and rainy Tuesday night, Vitello’s first crack at this two-city skirmish that dates to the 1800s when baseball was transitioning into a sport in which fielders used gloves and pitchers threw overhand.

The Giants greeted World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto by scoring three quick runs in the opening inning, and Landen Roupp and five relievers combined to toss a three-hitter. Ohtani was hitless his first three at-bats (Roupp struck him out on a sinker and curve) and finally legged out an infield single in the seventh inning, the 53rd straight game he reached base.

No problem. Erik Miller struck out the next batter, Kyle Tucker, to strand two runners. At every turn, VItello made the right bullpen move, from Ryan Borucki to Matt Gage to Miller to Keaton Winn to Walker. The supposed weakest part of the roster stepped up in major fashion to the delight of 40,066 fans, at least those not outfitted in Dodger blue.

Vitello got his wish. He was hoping the fire and passion from certain days on the nine-game trip would carry over to the homestand. Remember JT Brubaker’s popoff in Cincinnati? Roupp’s seemingly intentional plunking? Miller’s f-bomb attack on the Reds’ entire roster. Mix in some playful shadow boxing between Vitello and Drew Gilbert in Washington, and you’re left with a splendid mix of fire and frivolity, not to mention four wins in five games.

Tuesday, Miller emphasized that theme especially when discussing the relievers, who were given next to zero credit by outsiders entering the season.

“A lot of guys are pitching with a little more of an edge,” Miller said. “Not to quote what I said [in Cincinnati], but more of an f-you on the mound. It could be different for every guy. Not everybody is going to be outwardly emotional. I’d say a lot of guys are not. But maybe you’re seeing it a little bit more. … It seems to me we’re trying to prove some people wrong.”

Vitello loves it, of course. His energy is a key reason Buster Posey pulled him out of the college ranks to manage the Giants, thinking his intense mindset toward handling players and running games in Tennessee could work in San Francisco.

Now he’s in the middle of a classic rivalry. Which is nothing new. Tennessee had plenty of rivals in the SEC. Arkansas, because Vitello coached there. Vanderbilt, because it’s in the same state. LSU, because of recruiting battles. Basically, it was every team in the conference because the Volunteers were so good in those years.

Kind of how it is for the Dodgers. Every city they visited, fans consider them rivals if only because they’re the dreaded Dodgers. The filthy rich Dodgers. The champion Dodgers. San Diego. Houston. Phoenix. St. Louis. Anaheim. New York. New York again. You name it. Even Toronto now for obvious reasons.

The Dodgers are so good they don’t have to acknowledge they have a rivalry with any team. Oh, there will be some in their clubhouse who’ll call the Giants the main rival, but until the Giants start making the playoffs a habit, the one-sidedness will remain the status quo. It’s up to Vitello and his crew to change that.

The initial observation of the rivalry? Vitello seemed impressed. Willy Adames had prepped him about anticipating a different vibe in the crowd, and Vitello felt it.

“Everyone kind of filters into their seat a little bit tardy or fashionably late, and then you look up by the time we’re hitting in the bottom of the first, and it’s a playoff-type atmosphere,” he said. “It’d be great to drown out the opposing fans, no matter whether they’re Yankees, Dodgers, Cubs, whoever. But it also kind of makes it fun when there’s a little splattering of the opponents’ fans in the stadium, because you get some of that back and forth.”

Slowly but surely, Vitello is feeling at home. Monday night, he ran into some Giants fans and found himself at a Dave Chappelle show at Punch Line Comedy Club. He said he needed a laugh after Sunday’s loss in Washington and wound up getting a fist bump from Chappelle himself.

The win came on a day the Giants placed .478-hitting catcher Daniel Susac on the injured list with right elbow ulnar neuritis (replaced by Eric Haase) and moved reliever José Buttó to the 60-day injured list. The Giants got a scare when Jung Hoo Lee was slow to get up after getting thrown out at the plate in the sixth inning. After the game he said his quadriceps area got “banged up,” and Vitello said he could be available to play Wednesday.