2008 Philadelphia Phillies (div title pics)

This is an overdue post which really dates back a month, but being a Philadelphia sports fan and having to contend with the curse of Billy Penn and general bad luck over the years I didn't want to risk posting this too soon and jinxing the Phillies' chances.

First, let's cue up the appropriate music here (2:49), here (3:01), or here (4:53)—all the same song so probably different edit versions, but I didn't listen to them all the way through to know for sure.

Back on September 27th, I attended the Phillies game against the Washington Nationals, only my second attendance of the year. It was the next to last game of the regular season and as it turned out it also happened to be the night they clinched the National League East division title over their rivals the New York Mets. I'd had the two tickets for a month or so and it was just luck of the draw that it turned out to be a key game. I went with a close friend of mine who's also a fan.

Back in the mid-70s my parents used to take my brother and me to the games when the Phils played at Veterans' Stadium and we'd get general admission seats for the 700 level (nose-bleed seats way up there). Adult tickets were $2.50 I think and kids 12 and under got in for a mere 50 cents. So my loyalty goes back. I'm not just a bandwagon jumper. I still wear the classic "old logo" cap to prove it.

Now back then I was much more into sports than I am now. Time, circumstances, and just growing older have inevitably dampened the old childhood enthusiasm somewhat. I still root for all the local teams, but I no longer take it too much to heart if they lose. Heck, repeated losing over the years tends to have that effect if only for the sake of emotional stability and mere survival.

Even so, it's still something special when one of "our" teams actually rises up and makes a serious playoff run to contend for a championship. And now as I found out it's really very special to actually be there in the atmosphere of the crowd when the game unfolds.

I know my parents would have enjoyed it. There was some bittersweetness to things as I kept wishing the Phils could have put their pennant run together 3 years ago so Dad could have enjoyed it. I wasn't the only fan thinking that either as I was amazed at many similar stories being told on local sports talk radio as fans recounted having lost relatives and close friends who were big fans.

There were many such cases with direct team involvement too such as "Whiz Kids" centerfielder and then long-time color commentator Richie "Whitey" Ashburn, 1980 closer Tug McGraw (Tim's Dad for you country music fans), ex-player and long-time coach John Vukovich, Paul Owens (former GM known as "The Pope"). Then during the National League Championship Series Phils' manager Charlie Manuel lost his 87 year old Mother suddenly and centerfielder Shane Victorino lost his Grandmother. There just seemed to be many instances where fans were pointing to such circumstances and claiming a little bit of divine intervention from on high. I don't know really, but it's a nice thought I suppose.

Anyway, enough rambling, on to the pictures...

The day was overcast. The first two shots show the Philadelphia skyline. You can barely make out the statue of William "Billy" Penn atop city hall about a quarter of the way from the right edge of the image. The source of the alleged curse is that the city used to restrict other buildings to remain below the height of Billy and once that restriction was lifted the "curse" began. As you can see there are several buildings now taller. In order to get around the curse a mini statue of Billy Penn was placed on the top beam of the new Comcast Tower so that he would again overlook all other buildings in the city for the duration of the playoffs. The third pic on this first line of shots just sets the scene inside the stadium very early in the game.




I arranged these next three shots so that they appear to be a series showing one pitch being thrown, but they're not. They're all showing 45 year old Jamie Moyer pitching to the same batter, but different pitches. In the last shot you can see it was only fouled off in front of the Phillies dugout anyway, so it's not like anything important happened right then, but I like the pics anyway.




The first one in this set is another from early in the game, this time with Washington Nationals' pitcher John Lannan throwing to the Phils' Chase Utley who also fouled it off. (Everytime I tried to get an action shot the batters kept fouling it off!) The two pics after that jump to late in the game. The Phils were leading by two in the eighth inning and my friend and I noticed some guys up on the roof of the stadium. It turned out they were up there (we figured) to do whatever they had to do in preparation for setting off fireworks over the stadium if the Phils hung on to their lead. The third pic shows a mound conference because the Nationals had gotten runners on 1st and 2nd with only one out against Phils' closer Brad Lidge.




After the mound conference was over and the game resumed, Lidge gave up a hit to drive in a run pullin the Nationals to within a run. Another baserunner loaded the bases before Lidge got the batter to ground into a game-ending double play, Rollins to Utley to Howard and division title celebration was on. Grown men being paid millions of dollars jumping on top of one another in front of 45,000 screaming fans. The pictures pretty much speak for themselves here for a while. I didn't capture the actual fireworks, but you can obviously see the smoke hanging in the air afterwards in two of the shots.






Still celebrating. Our seats were in the upper deck along the left field line, pretty close to the main scoreboard and video screen (known as Phanavision). There they were showing some celebration from inside the locker room, in this case Ryan Howard was being interviewed and it was broadcast to the fans in the stadium. Then you can see the on-field hoopla moved over to directly in front of the Phillies' dugout.




More shots of the massive scoreboard, one showing a closeup of some fans enjoying the moment, the next one showing a wider view including the centerfield area. I believe that's Brad Lidge being interviewed in the locker room amid the champagne spray. Then I took another shot of the city skyline and one of the skyline contrasted with the stadium scoreboard. By that time it was actully darker than those pics make it appear, I think, but my camera setting brought out the lights and general features more, which was actually a good thing in my opinion. A very light drizzle began just after the game had ended.






My friend and I had left our seats and made our way down to the lower levels to walk around to an exit out to the parking lots. Since we were getting closer to the field, I wanted to venture a little closer and see if I could get some closer field-level shots. I did, but you can't really make out anybody significant in the sea of players, stadium personnel, security, grounds crew, whomever. And I didn't want to bull my way down even closer where more fans were congregating. At that point it's general mayhem. Some players had come back to the field to revel and talk to the fans, thanking them for their support, but again I couldn't point out anyone in particular.




One last shot of the giant scoreboard, though I don't know who the people are being shown or if they're even players. They look like they should be, but I don't recognize them from that shot.

       

...And that final one is a pic I took just this morning of me wearing my classic "70s P" Phillies cap and holding my free rally towel that they handed out to all fans entering the stadium that night (and throughout the ensuing playoffs). Obviously the idea of the rally towel is for all the fans to wave/twirl them high and create a stirring visual fan frenzy image which will look good on TV and spur the team to a rally. I find it's handy to have for other reasons though... If I go into a restaurant and the service is slow, well, now I can wave my rally towel to get things going! Stuck in line at the DMV?... Rally towel time!   :-)


All in all, it was quite a fun night at the time and though I didn't go to any playoff or world series games it was an extraordinary run for the team and area fans. It doesn't happen very often for Philly teams, so it's nice to savor when it does. I just hope it's not another quarter century before a major Philly team wins a championship again.

When Philly teams aren't in the playoffs I always like to pick another team or two with long-suffering fans who know the repeated heartbreaks and bitter disappointments of rooting for a starcrossed team. So next year if the Phillies aren't in the thick of things, I'm pulling for those Chicago Cubs. I know nothing of their players, it's simply the fans I sympathize with. After all, in 2007 the Phillies became the first professional sports franchise to accumulate 10,000 losses in their long history, so I know something of suffering with my sports teams.


Just a couple other minor tidbits from that night...

In a crowd of 45,000 there had to be right in our section a guy wearing a NY Mets cap (the Mets are the Phils' "hated" rivals) holding up a sign for and cheering the Nationals' Lastings Milledge. Apparently he used to play for the Mets, but I would have had no clue if it weren't for this one guy cheering for him. Whenever Milledge batted the guy held up his sign (I didn't see exactly what it said). The Phils fans around him spontaneously erupted into a taunting chant of, uh, a 2-syllable 7-letter word beginning with A. I could have done without that only because of little kids being around, but at least the guy was not physically attacked. I give him credit for some guts, but I cannot fathom why he would attend a Phils/Nationals game and root for a marginal (I assume since I'd never heard of him otherwise) player just because he used to be with the Mets. Maybe it was mostly just to root against the Phils, but still...

As the 9th inning was unfolding and Brad Lidge got the first out quickly, I asked my friend to exchange seats. He had been on the end of the seating aisle by the stairway and I was in the next seat. But in trying to get pictures sometimes the fans in front of me would wave their towels and disrupt a shot. I couldn't possibly ask them NOT to wave their towels in support of the Phils, so I figured the exchange of seats would give me a better angle without disturbing anyone else. Which would have been fine except that the Nationals then proceeded to get men on base and even scored a late run to pull within one and still have the bases loaded. Being Phils' fans we naturally can be somewhat superstitious, so my friend said we had to swap seats back. Superstitious or not, it worked. Lidge threw the double play ball and the evening ended up celebratory after all. Who knows what would have happened if we hadn't swapped our seats back? The Phils owe their world championship to my friend and me. I want a day with the trophy!   :-)