By Cody Straub –
Think back just about one month ago to the beginning of September: Philadelphia sports fans were living it up.
All those jolly fans were getting their fingers fit for their World Series ring and buying their “dream team” jerseys by the bulk at local sporting goods store. Who knew so much could change in just a month in the sports world.
Those pre-ordered rings are now worth as much as the plastic rings you find in the cereal box and Michael Vick jerseys have become quite a popular dog toy over the past few weeks. So what happened in this dreadful month that led Philadelphia fans down this dark, tumultuous road?
The Phillies had the best rotation in baseball and too much depth to even gander a thought of losing a playoff series while the Eagles just shelled out all sorts of money to star free-agents in a matter of days, making them everyone’s early Superbowl favorite. Then September 18 rolled around, the day the world went dark for all Philadelphia sports fans.
While right then it may have just seemed like a bump in the road with both the Eagles and Phillies losing that day, it was really the start of catastrophic events for all of Philly. The”dream team” (I guess I should call them just the Eagles from now on, because who in the right mind would call a team with one win in five tries a “dream team?”) have not won a game since that week two loss to Atlanta and the loss on September 18 was the start of an eight game losing streak for the not so “phitin phils.” Now the Phillies are sitting at home watching the playoffs like everyone else and the Eagles aren’t even worth your Sunday afternoon anymore.
The sad part is that there is no one else for these teams to blame but themselves and their fans know it. Believe it or not walking around school you don’t hear, “The refs made them jump off-sides,” or “Well maybe if the umpire could see, the Phillies could have manged one run.” No, none of that is heard because as obnoxious as Philly fans are, they are smart enough to know that their teams have not met the lofty expectations everyone had for them.
All of these tragic events have led to many people asking themselves: what’s next? Football has all of a sudden become meaningless in Philadelphia, baseball being over before November has many Phillies fans confused and to top it off, Sixers fans won’t be able to cheer their team on because of the NBA lockout. This has led to many people climbing on top of their roofs and asking the sports gods what they did to deserve this, only to be talked down from jumping off the roof by the promise that there is always next year.