Hey Phillies, here is to eating lightning and crapping thunder…
Hey Phillies, here is to eating lighting and crapping thunder…
TEAM OF DESTINY
The Cast
Mark Filler
28 October 2022
Have I really not blogged since the second week of the NFL season? Ugghhh. Today, I woke up and knew I would fix it for some reason, but then the chore of going through my half-written hundreds of brainstormed blog topic ideas kind of made me rethink things. It sounded exhausting and time-consuming, even if it WOULD be fun. Anyway, I am NOT going that direction, so you are welcome. I realized coincidentally what day was today, and then deleted ALL of the topic ideas. I am starting from scratch and only covering ONE single topic today. My Phillies, the team of destiny. Nothing mapped out or outlined. I am just going to TYPE. Sort of like Forrest Gump just decided to start running.
I won’t blitz you with stats and numbers, as people who do sports full-time for their job have that covered pretty much. So, I will focus on the feeling of what is going on. I will focus on why I care. I will even start us out with my LinkedIn post this morning for work.
“You have to have the right product. You have to get hot at the right time. You have to have the proper leaders, stars, and role players. And, you have to have a system that works.
Tonight, the Philadelphia Phillies face the mighty Houston Astros in Game 1 of the World Series. Win or lose, the Phillies have made a huge statement, pumped up the city, and made it clear that what they have in place might be the plan for the present and future. It has been a heck of a run, and that Bryce Harper at bat in the NLCS was just plain storybook. Well, LUCI knows it has the product that was created when all other products out there were simply too complex to maintain. LUCI has gotten hot as installation dates are nonstop until Christmas and Q1 is already booking. We have Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola in Mike Epstein and Nick Jensen (CEO, CIO), as they had a vision of throwing a curve ball to the casino industry and provide the leadership to do just that. LUCI has the star Bryce Harper in Devon Bellman, our CTO, who has continued to perfect a solution that controls all lighting, audio, and video for an elevated customer on-property experience. We have the role players who understand perfectly how they fit into this disruptive platform. And, we know our system saves clients massive amounts of money on rack and player hardware, and provides design and consultative services to every client after delivery.
The Phillies are winners either way and have set themselves up nicely for 2023, and LUCI has done the same thing. We are both swinging for the fences.”
Sure, I don’t need you to focus on the work part. But, let’s talk about what IS going on with the actual team. Last year, the precedent (again) that a hot team could win it all in MLB. The Braves had a similar record to the Phillies, and stats across the board that were hauntingly familiar. This year, the Phillies barely got into the playoffs. They were forgotten, AND we had a new playoff format. The new playoff format also had two short series in the wildcard and divisional rounds, meaning a team with two absolute stud pitchers could blow through a better team. Check. That is what the Phillies did. And Ranger Suarez even helped out. For the longer NLCS, most thought the Phillies were in trouble. I even recognized the talent differential, and the fact that the Padres knocked out the DODGERS (Side note: They will change up the format again, as the fact that the Dodgers and Mets got knocked out in short series probably angered some people). But, the Phillies did their thing, threw in a storybook at bat for their star, and here we go with the World Series.
I became a fan quite young. My Dad took me to some games, and I even got to hear my favorite player, Mike Schmidt, get booed in person when he went 0-4 during a regular season game. Oh, Philly fans get a bad rap, but they DO love their sports. Don’t like them. Heck, I don’t even like them, but they are passionate and don’t wait until playoff games like some California fan bases. They will throw snowballs at Santa Claus, and throw stars under the bus, but they WILL show up and cheer…or boo. I got a World Series title as a youngster in 1980 after Pete Rose defected from the Reds and joined the Phillies. Hey, it was sort of like the Sixers getting Moses Malone and then catching fire in 1983. Anyway, I was a big Mike Schmidt and Phillies fan.
When I moved to Colorado, they had a new baseball team, and I had to contemplate whether to be a local sports fan and like the Rockies. Negative, ghost rider. The pattern is full. I stayed with the Phils, and was rewarded again in 2008 with another World Series title. Good times once again. The team disbanded and retooled. I still rooted for the Rockies when the Phillies weren’t in it, but my loyalty remained out East. THEN, my team got MY favorite player. You would think that my favorite player, being a South Jersey kid, would be Mike Trout (from 20 minutes from where I grew up). But, that is not the case. I became sort of a Bryce Harper fan. I pictured Trout and Harper being Magic-Bird. Not too hardcore, but I did root for him. He seems like an asshole, all, but I just met his PR director in Aspen in late September, and he told me this. Bryce doesn’t care if people think he is an asshole. He does his charity work and nice things for the community without talking about it, recording it, etc. He just does his thing. Not everyone has that sparkling personality we love on the mic, I guess.
Side Note #1. Watch your finances. When the Phillies win the title, the economy bottoms out. It happened in 1929 with the A’s. It happened in 1980. It happened in 2008. And if it happens this year, watch out. Just saying.
Side Note #2. The Phillies have the best mascot in sports. Period. I met him once or twice way back when as a kid. I am sure he would remember me, of course.
Side Note #3. Did I mention also that I threw down $33 before the playoffs that the Phillies win it all? Pays out a grand (and I have been betting each game too). Good run thus far.
Back to now. Bryce became one of those epic Philly moments in the Padres series. I nearly gave my napping wife a heart attack when I came out of the back cave/room yelling after the home run. The Phillies finished off the game, the moment became storybook immediately, and now the team can make that moment even MORE special by winning it all. The Eagles are good, the Flyers are overachieving, the Sixers are…well, let’s forget about them for a second…and the Phillies are doing their magic to get this city up once again.
I really do believe the Phillies are winners either way. This run is already pretty legendary. I do realize the Astros are the more complete team. I do realize the flaws the Phillies have all over the place, and how the Astros might excel at applying pressure on those weaknesses. I do understand that if Justin Verlander, pitching demonically recently, gets two starts, that might be two automatic wins. I do realize that after Nola and Wheeler, the Phillies are fragile. I do realize that if we broke down pitching, hitting, defense, managers, bullpen, etc. that the Phillies probably wouldn’t win most of those categories against this team. I do realize that the Phillies FIRED their title-winning manager to have some interim manager help them limp to the sixth seed.
If we search through Philadelphia lore, we can find other examples of Cinderella stories. Too many to list. Lots of Rocky Balboas throughout time. But, the first one that popped in my head while jamming this blog out was 1985 Villanova. They were outmatched in every category but sucked up enough magic for 40 minutes to beat Patrick Ewing and friends. What a ride THAT was.
Now, true, the obvious argument is that this is best of seven games and not 40 minutes of college hoops. True. I accept that argument. It was an improv, regional parallel as opposed to a thought out statistical argument. So, let’s get past that too. The Astros can only have one pitcher pitching at a time. The Astros can only have one hitter hitting at a time. Same amount of players on defense. Same rules. And they don’t have trash cans to pound. This is sort of my Gene Hackman Hickory speech, by the way.
I could tell you how Castellanos, Schwarber, and Hoskins are finally doing what we expected of them. I could tell you that Bryce Harper finally looks like he is ready to put a team on his back. I could tell you that Robertson and Alvarado are not the best in the league, but they are adequate for what this hot team needs (the Avs just won a title pretty much with no goalie, folks). I could tell you how I love Eflin, Suarez, or Syndergaard to have magical moments. I could tell you that Aaron Nola is interestingly the last pitcher to even beat the Astros before this run. But, you don’t need me to tell you all of this.
So, let’s do this, Phils. Let’s embrace Ed Pinckney, Rocky, the Philly Special, Tug McGraw, the Broad Street Bullies, Chase Utley, Dick Vermeil, and every other personality that came from the City of Brotherly Love.
It would go against this entire blog to say Phillies in seven, as that is not recognizing how hot this team is. It would be too cocky to say this will be a sweep, as the Astros are indeed that good. But, I root for the Phils in 5 on home field, and I think it will be the Phils in 6 in Houston. AND, I think Nola wins tonight to scare the crap out of Houston against their ace.
Enjoy the World Series, all. Go Phils. You are truly a Team of Destiny.