We always gave Dusty Baker another chance. Until now

Oh, Dusty.

We love you, we really do. You’re a world-class gentleman, a top-shelf manager, the only former Dodger a Giants fan could ever embrace as one of our own.

But this is just too much.

You, Dusty Baker, just picked the wrong bloody hill to die on.

No more rooting for you to finally win the World Series. Not with the Houston Astros, who stole their trophy in 2017 and won’t give it back. Not for Astros owner Jim Crane, who learned all the billions in his bank can’t buy him a clue.

Sorry, boss. This is where we decide it’s time we start seeing other managers.

We admired you for being a man’s man when you played ball for 19 years over three decades, making two All-Star teams, winning a Gold Glove and cashing out on a playoff MVP certificate.

We even forgave you for winning the ’81 World Series with the Dodgers, which normally would blacklist you from this life to the next.

You managed our Giants to three playoff runs, and we overlooked the fact that your best player was ‘roid raging all the live-long day under your watch. After all, you’re the one who had to share meals with Barry Bonds and Jeff Kent at the same time, not us. We consider that keep earned.

You pulled Russ Ortiz in Game 6 of the 2002 World Series, and we didn’t rue you forever. Our hearts broke for you when Steve Bartman ruined your chance of taking the Cubs to the Series the next year.

When you managed the Reds, we wanted you to win it all during those odd-numbered years when the Giants weren’t. When you went to the Nationals, it broke our hearts to see you lose in the playoffs to the Dodgers in 2016.

Those 1,863 wins rank 15th on the all-time list. The three Manager of the Year plaques hanging in the den mean much. All you need now is to win a World Series as a manager, and Cooperstown will run out of excuses to keep you from a Hall of Fame enshrinement you already are worthy of on merit.

We’re sorry. Can’t watch that happen.

The Astros are baseball’s biggest collective of cheats since the 1919 Chicago Black Sox, with one big difference: those guys cheated by letting the other team win. These Astros robbed the Yankees and Dodgers of that right.

They stole signs, because everyone steals signs, so what’s the big deal?

They did it with cameras. They installed a TV by the dugout. They beat on trash cans to tip off their hitters, because that’s the sort of trash move that trash teams make.

They broke the rules, and baseball ignored every suspicion raised, and every complaint filed, until one of their former players came clean. It’s as if current baseball commissioner Rob Manfred went to the office archives on crisis management and pulled out The Steroid Era Files to be informed.

You joined this sinking ship, Dusty, and for a minute we like the move. You were the perfect candidate to make this thing right. You’d bring class and dignity and contrition to an arrogant, unapologetic organization.

And what do we get this week at spring training?

The sorriest sorries in the history of apologies.

“Our opinion is that this didn’t impact the game,” your new boss Crane said, with a straight face, no less. “We had a good team. We won the World Series. And we’ll leave it at that.”

We? No. We’ll leave it at this: You’re a bunch of jewelry thieves who won’t send back your trophy or put away your rings. You learned nothing of redeeming value. If choosing between you and the Dodgers, we’ll bleed blue, thank you very much.

Still love you, Dusty. But on this one, you’re on your own.