“Don’t pinch yourself. You’re not dreaming.
“This Phillies team is that good. They lead an overmatched Diamondbacks team, 2-0, and they’re two wins away from a second straight pennant. They match up well against both the Rangers and Astros. Dream big.”
— Inquirer columnist Marcus Hayes, 10/19/23
Your dream, his nightmare.
Hayes is a former Daily News colleague, a good guy who threw the best New Year’s office parties for the years he lived in Old City.
Normally, he is a nightmare for any player, manager, or owner who rubs his fur the wrong way.
He’s a strong writer, kind of a social justice warrior, with strong opinions that are often wrong. Sometimes he jumps the rails and yields to irrational enthusiasm. It’s like he’s possessed.
A few weeks before basically guaranteeing a World Series win, he said the Eagles would win their first nine games.
I emailed him to to ask what odds he would lay, as I had $100 to bet.
He did not reply. Maybe he was too busy — I’m sure he gets hundreds of messages — or maybe he was pissed at me for having the gall to challenge the opinion of the “expert.”
Of course, I want the Eagles to win, but it is damn hard to win nine straight in the NFL. I would have made that $100 bet.
And it would not have been the first time I bet against the Eagles.
In 2018, I predicted the Eagles would lose the Super Bowl, [see photo at top] and that I would eat that column if I was wrong. This blog post explains what happened.
I had several things in my mind.
First, the long and inglorious history of Philadelphia sports teams breaking our freaking hearts. Like what happened Tuesday night at the Bank.
Second, I knew the prediction would infuriate masses of fans and the column would be talked about, and maybe even lead to a mob with pitchforks and torches outside my office.
Third, it was a reverse jinx. Of course, I wanted the Eagles to win, but everyone else was saying they would win, and if I joined in, the football gods would punish me if I predicted a win.
So they did win, and I ate that column, at a news conference suggested by Terry Egger, the then publisher of the Philadelphia Inquirer, who actually liked me. Which put him in a minority at the Inquirer. Not complaining, just saying.
The point is this: Any professional sports writer who guarantees anything is like a pig on ice.
Sports is too dynamic, too quirky, too filled with snares, to be cocksure about anything.
And Philadelphia teams are built to break your heart.
I don’t count on or put money on any Philadelphia sports team. It seems they are sure to let you down. The Flyers are terrible, the Sixers almost got there but didn’t, the Eagles almost won the Super Bowl but didn’t, the Phillies were up 2-0 in the playoffs and blew it. If I feel like gambling I will buy a lottery ticket, I think I have better chances of winning. A soured Philadelphia sports fan.
I have been disappointed by Philly sports teams since before 1964. I rarely ever bet them. I never root against them but never guarantee a win for them.
Sounds right.
It’s a been a long and painful history for the Phillies, and I’ve sat here and watched it all, and suffered.
I remember 1964 only as a very young boy who expected my team to be in a World Series (everybody on my Little League team wanted #6). Then the Phillies traded Ferguson Jenkins for Bob Buhl and Larry Jackson because they thought they needed veteran pitching to contend in 1965. Oopsie, and on to a full decade of sheer misery.
In 1975, things started to look up when Dave Cash got here and they brought Dick Allen back. Then came the nightmare of 1977, when the Phillies held a two-run lead in Game #3 of the five-game NLCS against the Dodgers with two out in the 9th inning, nobody on, and closer Gene Garber on the hill.
Ancient Vic Davalillo drops a perfect drag bunt. Ancient Manny Mota hits a drive to left that Luzinski cannot catch (Danny Ozark had replaced The Bull with defensive wizard Jerry Martin all season long in late innings, but on this day, he does not. Martin ABSOLUTELY catches that ball). Davalillo scores and Mota moves up to third when Ted Sizemore mis-handles Luzinski’s throw to second. Davey Lopes then hits a shot to Mike Schmidt that he cannot handle. The ball deflects to Larry Bowa who picks it with his bare hand and throws a rocket to first to nab Lopes by less than a step. But this is the days before replay, and the umpire MISSES THE CALL. The game is tied. Garber then tries to pick Lopes off first and throws the ball away, Lopes taking second. SS Bill Russsell follows with a grounder up the middle. 6-5 Dodgers, and that’s how it ends. The next night, Tommy John (he of Tommy John surgery fame), shuts down the Phillies in a game played in a steady downpour.
Now THAT is pain.
Finally, 1980 brought redemption, and the boys finally, finally, climbed that 100-year mountain and won it all. It was glorious, and we enjoyed it all and those guys became legends.
The team got back to the series in 1983 with a geriatric core of Pete Rose, Joe Morgan and Tony Perez on board, but lost to a better Orioles team.
Another full decade of suck ensured.
They finally got back to the promised land in 1993, when a rag-tag bunch of misfits and castoffs led by the quite insane Lenny Dykstra got past the Braves to make it to the World Series, at which time Mitch Williams gave up the second walk-off championship homer in history to Joe Carter, turning a 4-2 lead in Game #6 into a stunning 5-4 defeat. Thanks, Jim Fregosi, for throwing a guy out there who had NOTHING left in a key spot. In Fregosi’s defense, the bullpen was as shot as THIS Year’s bullpen apparently was.
We once again got to the top of the mountain in 2008, when Utley, Rollings, Howard & Co. brought life back to the city. But even they had to hand us heartache again in 2009, losing to the Yankees in the series, and then again in 2011, when perhaps the best team in Phillies history was stymied by the Cardinals 1-0 in the clinching NLCS game. Ryan Howard made the last out, blowing out his Achilles tendon on the play and effectively ending both his career and an era of Phillies baseball.
And that brings us up to date, when yet another Phillies team dashes hopes by losing to an underrated, yet very good and very determined Arizona Diamondbacks team. They got out-played, plain and simple, the big bats going cold at the worst possible moment.
Not like we haven’t seen that before.
When the last out was recorded, another Phillies squad that we loved immediately ceased to exist. Next year will bring different players, and different vibe, and who knows what. The Braves are still the Braves. The Mets will spend a FORTUNE to get better. The Marlins will be improved. We may well lose both Aaron Nola and Rhys Hoskins. That will suck.
But we are an insane fan base. We will be back. We will support the boys in red pinstripes until we cease to exist. It’s what we do. Hope in baseball springs eternal, and despite 140 years of evidence to the contrary, we will say it again:
Wait ’til next year.
Very comprehensive. 👏
Everything freeze said. The sports teams, all of them in this city will madden you, will break your heart and tease you with some success. But guess what, they’re our teams, all of them and we’ll never abandon an endless amount of hope. I frequent an Eagles bar down here in Houston often, and there’s an Eagles banner hanging prominently that states “Nobody likes us, we don’t care!” That about sums it up. My son and I will be there Sunday in our Kelly green Kelce jerseys.
Voting for a Philadelphia team victory is like voting for Typhoid Mary.
I told certain powers that be that it’s a mistake to have someone regularly write columns with a political slant for the sports section. I used to hear from people all the time about how annoying it was.
I felt then and still feel that there were people who held their nose about the political slant in the news sections but still bought the paper for sports, and it was like the paper insisted on chasing them down and hitting them with left wing political opinions in every section – and I mean every.
I’ve been content to limit my sports reading to box scores online for years now. They can try to force me to read a politicized sports section, but they can’t succeed. I stopped reading Yahoo Sports and watching ESPN for the same reason
On the colum
There are a few limited cases where it is required. Most are not and the ideologues who run the Inky don’t seem to understand pushing politics in a section where people go to ESCAPE politics is bad business.
On the main point of the column, I don’t know how anyone who has lived here long enough can ever be certain of ultimate postseason success. I was conditioned by so many near misses during my youth to always expect the worst to happen. It’s extra special on those very rare occasions when the worst doesn’t happen.
👌
On a given day or any given series both teams have a shot. The Miracle Mets and Joe Namath’s jets come to mind. The Phillies had a very successful season. They beat the best team in baseball the Atlanta Braves. Always hoping & cheering for the Fightins.
When I was in the Promotions Department at The Bulletin back in the mid-70’s, I created the line for their sports coverage, “With us, sports is more than just a game.” In reality, sports is a business; a big business. And like any business, not every endeavor is a success. That includes creating concepts that appear as tremendous wins on paper, but that turn out to be duds, much to everyone’s surprise. Based on their play during the end of the regular season into the playoffs, we all expected the Phillies to dominate the Diamondbacks. Even after the losses in Arizona, with the return home, how could we not win game 6, or worse case, game 7? How? Stuff (being polite) happens! Go Eagles; Go Flyers; Go Sixers! In other other words, here we “go” again!!
In Philly sports, history repeats itself.
All of comments have covered the in’s and out’s better than i could today, but I’ll just say that I was telling myself Phils would win Game 7, but not really believing it. Not because I though the D backs were better, but because it’s Philly and we lose these games. Tough being a sports fan here, but who needs championship parades every year anyway….:)
When we lost the 2 games in the Desert, I knew that we were Toast. I love the Phillies and The Eagles and I always want them to win, but I feel like I’m walking a razor thin line when I bet them. $100 bucks down the drain. Oh Well! I bet the NFC Championship too, I guess I;ll never learn GO EAGLES!
Phillies first two games: 15 runs. Phillies last five games: 15 runs.