I have been a die hard Philadelphia sports fan for as long as I've been breathing. I've waited my entire life to see a championship team. Every team had fallen short multiple times, some more than others. But after 20 years, and 16 days, the Philadelphia Phillies delivered. The World Series Champions represented Philadelphia, a team more championship-starved than the city itself. 1 championship in 124 years suddenly became 2 championships in 125 years.
The beginning may have began 125 years ago, when Baseball's oldest franchise brought America's first professional sport to America's first capital, part of the original 13 colonies.
The beginning may have began when the Philadelphia Flyers won the city's first championship, Lord Stanley's Cup in 1974 (no real Philadelphia sports fan counts the Eagle's 1948 NFL Championship - The Vince Lombardy trophy is the only one worth counting) and broad street got it's first taste of 2 million plus crowding it's asphalt.
The beginning may have began as soon as Moses Malone and the 1983 Seventy-Sixers fo' fo' fo'ed their way to an NBA Champsionship, the only one in team history. This marked a different kind of beginning - the beginning of the end. Broad Street remained crowded, albeit without parade buses and stands to display sports heros. Cars and businessmen patrolled Broad Street with many of them gladly trading their soul to see one more day of millions packing Broad Street for miles and miles. There were to be no more championships in Philadelphia for 25 years. Counting the Eagles championship in 1960 (which really doesn't count) it had been a combined 134 years since Philly's last excuse for a parade. Let me rephrase that - legitimate parade. No AFL team counts. My dad and I go by this old rule. Would you rather have a professional sports team of your town win a championship or find a 5 dollar bill on the sidewalk? Exhibit A: The Soul. 5 dollars at least buys me a sausage and pepper at a Phillies game. Other teams and leagues to consider; The Kixx - our beloved indoor soccer team that won a championship in 2002. The Wings - a high flying lacrosse team that brought a trophy to town in oh-one. And thank god we don't have a WNBA team, but assuming they would be called the Bells (short for Libery Bells), I would rather have a crumpled up green piece of paper with Honest Abe's face on it than a bi-colored-smaller-than-regulation-ball-trophy gracing the halls of the Wachovia Center. Any of these 5 dollar trophies is mocking to me and anyone who calls themselves a Philadelphia sports fan - strike that, a sports fan PERIOD.
Getting back from my tangent...This is my beginning. I want to put these feelings in writing before they disappear. These feelings are of the 2008 World Series Champion Philadelphia Phillies. I love them all... yes even So Taguchi (he hit that bases clearing triple against the Mets remember? If it cost us a million dollars to suck the life out of the Mets with a 38-year-old Japanese outfielder who can't hit, run, field, or speak English to save his life, then it's a million dollars well spent in my book).
What exactly happened when the Phillies won the World Series? Well I pretty much lost it. Watching in my apartment with my other displaced Philadelphia fans in Pittsburgh, we each did our own "thing." After spilling 3 cups of chewed up sunflower seeds and spilling cups of water and gatorade all over my rug, each did what hit him at the moment. Some talked on the phone, some jumped repetitively, some smiled. Me? I cried like a baby. I compare my reaction to that of a tennis player winning a Grand Slam. After that last shot he sort of just crumples. He doesn't jump up or raise his arms while standing. He just... falls over. Like he lost all feelings in his legs. I jumped just like Brad Lidge and came down in a heap. I immediately started bawling. Tears came out of my eyes faster than Shane Victorino trying to talk to the media. I soaked a cushion of my couch as 12 dollar bottles of champagne were uncorked and poured into red plastic cups.
The Phillies had finally done it. Ahem, phinally done it. Had to make sure the classic Ph as an F made it in my first post somewhere. We are champions of the baseball world in 2008. It may be an American league, but the best of the best play here. We are the best in the world at baseball.
World, hear Philly roar. It won't get old anytime soon. I can promise you that.
World Champions. World FUCKING Champions. - Courtesy of Chase Utley
-Zach Leon
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