Baseball post

I don't write much about baseball because I know a number of people don't care about it and I like my stuff to be interesting to anyone. I just need to acknowledge the Phillies and the evolution of Philadelphia sports since I moved here in 1987.

When I was growing up in New York, Philly's sports teams were a nonentity. Then when I first moved here, it was loserville. The Eagles were awful, the Phillies were awful, they both played in a lousy stadium and that was just how it was. But over the years, first the Eagles and later the Phillies began to turn things around. Even without winning a Super Bowl, the Eagles have more than a decade of consistent excellence to draw on. The Phillies, historically one of worst teams in baseball, took longer to gather steam.

To this day, it's a little strange to hear national commentators refer to the Phillies as a powerhouse franchise like the Yankees. It's still weird to see that Philly is a place the people want to play. But it is. They have gathered and maintained a group of very talented, resourceful players with what seems to be an almost perfect team mentality, and in the process, they've completely changed baseball fans' approach to the game. Even this summer, when they were 7 (!) games out of first with a record of 48-46, some people were grumbling but I didn't here anyone giving up, saying the season was lost. The team has shown too often that it can overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles in the past and we've come to, if not expect, at least not be surprised when they do the near-impossible. And in doing so they've made Philadelphia a happier place every spring, summer and early fall.

As a sort-of math person, I like to think it's because they've learned that what you need to do is to always give 100%, rather than talking about giving 110%, which everyone knows is impossible.