Euphoria

The day we thought would never happen, happened.

After 28 years and one weather-lengthened week, the Phillies are World Series champions once again.

As the clock struck 10:00 on the East Coast, and the initial screams of disbelief subsided, my friend Matt uttered four profound words:

"I feel born again."

With one pitch, Brad Lidge completed his season-long masterpiece of perfection, and the Phillies won the 2008 World Series four games to one over the Tampa Bay Rays. With Eric Hinske's swing and miss, the levees holding back a quarter-century of tears, heartbreak, and frustration, came crumbling down. In one instant, a flood of emotion washed away the longest championship drought of any four-sport town. The man they call "Lights Out" ironically banished the shrouding darkness of 25 years.

Just over nine months from the day pitchers and catchers reported to spring training, an entire city was reborn.

Grown men and women of all ages were reduced to puddles, tears of unbridled, unparalleled joy streaming down their cheeks. Complete strangers were toasting and dancing and hugging in the streets. The weight, the burden, the misery of a hard-luck, hardcore sports town, was lifted in one spectacular moment, released in one uber-cathartic sigh, that none of us will ever forget.

For a terrific example, click here. Listen to that guy!

(Also enjoyable for the eruption is this one I found.)

And then the calls started coming in. Scott called me from the Upper West Side, screaming with cracks in his voice, "Did it really happen? Did it really happen??? I can't believe what I just saw!!!"

My boy Kevin, not one to be so outwardly emotional, called me from Seattle. I never heard the pitch of his voice so high in my life. "All of a sudden, I see the world differently," my choked-up friend said. "Perhaps there is a God after all."

My friend Jared sent me a text, on behalf of all of us under 30, saying, "We only had to wait our whole lives!"

Even my friend Mark, a (ahem) Yankees fan who had witnessed so much of my suffering, sent me a text saying: "this...changes...everything.....congrats."

And it does. It changes everything. Forever. Because now we have our stories. We have our "remember when" story, knowing exactly where we were, who we were with, and how we all reacted when Hinske swung and missed, when Lidge dropped to his knees and thanked the heavens, when Ryan Howard tackled Lidge and Ruiz to start the greatest pile-on this town has ever seen.

And maybe I'm alone on this one--or maybe I'm not--but I just knew it was going to happen. Somehow, deep down in my soul, something about Wednesday just felt different. While many of us were fuming at Bud Selig's suspension of Game 5 (and understandably so), dreading a typical Philadelphian reversal of fortune, I experienced a bizarre sense of calm that is and will remain completely beyond explanation. Maybe it was the sense of, "We've waited 28 years. What's two more days?" Maybe it was Penn State winning in Columbus for the first time in 30 years the Saturday before. Maybe it was the Phils and Eagles winning on the same day for the first time this year. Maybe, like Matt says, it was when we were able to take that obnoxious "saved by zero" commercial and make it into dance party music. I don't know. But I just knew it. That's all I've got for you.

And I was right. There were moments in this game that would have spelled doom for other Philly teams, where you know you were waiting for the worst to happen. In the ninth when Ben Zobrist hit a liner to right that looked like a hit. Instead it hung up just enough for Werth to make the catch. When Hinske came to the plate and you remembered that the only other at-bat the guy had he hit one that still hasn't landed, you feared the worst. And in the top of the 7th when it looked like the Rays were about to squeeze home a run that would have given them the lead, Chase Utley did it again with his fielding. He faked the throw to first, gunned it home, and Ruiz laid the most important tag in Phillies history on Jason Bartlett, right on the cheek, prompting yells of "IN DE FACE!" like Akeem from Coming to America. After the game, it occurred to me just how fitting that was. For all of the pundits, the experts, the naysayers, the haters, this Phillies team tagged them all out, right in the face.

And every ten minutes or so, I remind myself of the miracle we witnessed Wednesday night, and nothing can bother me.

Matt's mother Bess is often quoted saying, "Yestahday was yestahday. Today is today."

Today is redemption. Today is the rebirth of Philadelphians wherever they are. Today is the day where we can finally say what we've always wished we could: The Phillies are World Series Champions.

Today is a beautiful day.

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Other Musings:

When the Phils signed Geoff Jenkins in the off-season, before I really knew much of anything about him, I loved it. I've been calling him Leroy all season, and laughing to myself. If you don't know what I'm talking about, watch this. I promise you it's worth it.

In honor of the magical week that was, in lieu of asinine commercials, I'd like to give honorable mention to some commercials that make me laugh.

One is the T-Mobile commercial where the father comes home to announce the new family calling plan he signed them up for. The little boy says, "And you can call that lady at my soccer games you always stare at." The daughter says, "And I can call Derek." The father says, "Derek with the moustache and the Mustang, Derek?" "Yeah." "Yeah...no. It's weird, there's a no-Dereks-with-moustaches clause, it's in the fine print. Oh, what a drag, dude." Very funny.

Another T-Mobile one I like is with the younger brother who picks the same Fave Five as his sister, saying "Your friends are HOT." When she asks her father, "Are you gonna do anything?" he replies, "Maybe you should have uglier friends."

Also funny is the Domino's commercial for their new oven-toasted sandwiches (a novel idea!). The sub store employee has the Domino's guy leave the sandwich around the side of the building. I'm telling you, all week I've been going around saying, "But I love Submart!"

Lastly, a shout to my boy and hardcore Philly fan Adam "Shappy" Shapiro, whose latest ad is for Oberto beef jerky, and is very funny. (He's the one on the right.)

Phlying High

When I woke up Thursday morning and realized that the night before had been no dream, I jumped out of bed. Not that I wasn't tired, mind you. I was exhausted. I'd stayed up until about 3 in the morning, watching every highlight, interview, and pithy analysis, for two reasons:

1) I wanted to make the moment last as long as humanly possible, and

2) I wanted to make sure that everything I thought I'd just seen had actually happened.

And I don't know about you, but the layoff between has been a strange blessing for me as a fan. It's allowed me time to celebrate being National League champions and has afforded many an opportunity to factually say the words, "We're going to the World Series." It's created moments like one from a concert I went to the other night. I passed a guy in a Phillies hat and went up to him, put out my hand, and just said, "Phiiiiils!" He said, "I know! Say it with me now, 'We're going to the World Series.'" And it's given me time to watch baseball, while our season yet continues, without eating my fingernails.

Cole Hamels pitched another incredible game, making one mistake to the machine-like Manny, with no one on. The numbers are amazing: 2-0, 1.93 ERA in 14 innings; 3-0 for the playoffs with just 3 runs given up in 22 innings. And Jimmy Rollins may not be hitting up a storm just yet, but leadoff home runs can be devastating for a home team and crowd, and Jimmy's now done that in each series. And what else can be said about Shane Victorino, a warrior in every aspect of the game of baseball. The catch against the Best Buy sign (and Tim McCarver's brilliant comment that Victorino is probably the team's best buy of the last 10 years), is one I will never forget.

But there were some other incredible things that happened, that are at least worth mentioning, if not marveling over the fact that all of them, and not just one, happened:

1) Pat Burrell made a fantastic catch. I'm going to say that again: Pat Burrell made a fantastic catch. In the bottom of the sixth, Andre Ethier sent a shot deep into the corner of left field, that Burrell reached, caught and somehow hung onto. (And then--though perhaps I'm exaggerating--it seemed like he looked up right into the Dodgers fans' eyes, as if to say, "No no. No reason to get excited. I got it.")

2) In the bottom of the ninth, Casey Blake rocked an offering of Brad Lidge's very deep to centerfield. With his back literally to the wall, Victorino made the catch look easy. What is amazing is not so much the catch itself, but the fact that Blake's hit just didn't make it. That ball could not have been hit any deeper without being a home run that would've made things a whole lot scarier than they were. How often does that happen for us? How often is it exactly the opposite, with the ball finding a way somehow over the fence?

3) After Manny's home run ended Hamels' shutout bid, Russell Martin came up and worked the count full. And on a borderline pitch that Martin took, home plate umpire Mike Winters called it strike three. Inning over.

We got the call. Full count, close pitch, and we got the call. When does that happen? How bout never. But then....

3b) It happened again. Not a full count this time, but a more important situation, with Matt Kemp on second and Nomar Garciaparra on first, and two outs. The 2-2 pitch. Called third strike. Inning over. In all honesty, it was probably low, but I couldn't give a damn. We got another call.

Two more things worth mentioning:

1) Pat Gillick is the man. This guy makes all of the right moves that seemed small, yet completed this team (see Jayson Stark's article on ESPN.com) and what does he do when they present him with the National League trophy? He gave all of the credit to Ed Wade, his predecessor at GM, for "a tremendous job getting the nucleus here." All Gillick did, he said, was "kind of filled in around what Ed had in place." What class.

2) I totally fell in love with Charlie Manuel. We've all criticized him as manager, wondering just what the hell he's thinking. But this guy is the patriarch of a real baseball family. As he went to hug Hamels in the post-game celebration, you could see that he called him "my boy." That's why every every infielder is involved in every mound conference during the game. That's why every player leaves everything out on the field. That's why, even when no one outside of the locker room understood it, these guys swear by Manuel. Every player is like Christopher on the Sopranos, saying of their Tony, "I would march into Hell for that man." After losing his mom, June, on the day of Game 2, Charlie fought through it all, calm and cool, focused on being the leader his team needed him to be. And in his typical, understated fashion, dedicated the win to the people of Philly and to June. "I guarantee you my mom's watching right now."

And while ESPN.com writer Gene Wojciechowski is right that the champagne celebrations are overdone, the Phils earned this one. We earned this one.

I gave you beating the Brewers in four. I was one off when I said we'd beat the Dodgers in six. Tampa Bay is a very good team. But my friend Ben said it best:

"It's our time."

We're winning the World Series in six games.

Billy Joel knows what I'm doing. I'm keeping the phaith.

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Other Musings: Anyone notice that the drinkability ads are even bigger? The word itself is the focus of the campaign now, whereas before it was just a throw-in line. It's like someone read my blog and did it just to spite me.

Also dumb are the ESPN commercials where guys think that because they listen to them everyday that they know them. "Mike! Mike Tirico! It's me, Stupidy Stupid! I listen to you guys everyday!" If I were a celebrity, and someone just got into my car at the airport, I wouldn't think it some funny coincidence, a cute story to share at the ESPN Radio water cooler. No. I would think I was being carjacked. And that's not so funny.

Did anyone notice the postgame interview with Victorino where the guy asked him if he'd rather play the Red Sox or the Marlins? Oops.

Did anyone notice the guy (I think he was a scout?) who came over to Cole Hamels when he was being interviewed following the game and said something like, "The best looking guy and the best pitcher I know." Whoa, awkward.

Phreaking Out

Agony. Ecstasy. Defeat. Victory. Rinse. Repeat.

If you're like me--and I know I am--then describing last night as intense is like saying the Eiffel Tower has height. This game was ridiculous in every sense of the word. Up 2-0, then down 3-2. Looking like they were certain to tie it up in the top of the sixth, then they blew it, but then tied it up anyway on Chan Ho Park's wild pitch that brought in Ryan Howard. Then Chad Durbin comes in and gives the lead right back, a home run to Casey Blake. A couple of hits, Howard throws the ball away on a sacrifice bunt, and all of a sudden it's 5-3 Dodgers. Even after Chase Utley's fantastic catch and sliding tag of second base to double off Rafael Furcal kept the game close, I was miserable. And I know you all were too. "Now it'll be 2-2, it'll go 7, and we'll find a way to lose."

And my friend Mark, sitting with me at the bar in Hoboken, said, "Couple of runs is nothing. Remember, this is October."

And wasn't he right. Five outs away from having our 2-0 series lead erased, and Howard on first, Los Angeles Public Enemy #1 stepped to the plate. Shane Victorino, our Flyin' Hawaiian, nailed the first pitch from Cory Wade deep down the rightfield line, and somehow it cleared the fence into the Philly bullpen. Tie game. And Hiroki Kuroda was somewhere on the Dodger bench wishing he hadn't thrown at Victorino's head the night before.

Then, with Carlos Ruiz on first, Charlie Manuel sent waiver-deadline acquisition Matt Stairs to the plate to pinch-hit for Ryan Madson. Dodger manager Joe Torre brought in his closer, Jonathan Broxton, who hadn't given up a home run to ANYONE since May 31. And he hadn't given up one in Dodger Stadium since July of 2006. Take a moment, let that sink in. Stairs took a strike, and then three balls. Broxton reared back, fired his best fastball, and with one swing, the 40-year-old Canadian crushed the pitch, and the hearts of many a Dodger fan.

But of course that wasn't it. Brad Lidge reminded the world that you can strike out and still make it to first. With two on in the bottom of the eighth, in typical Philly fan fashion, I was waiting for the three-run shot that would give the Dodgers the lead back. But then Loney flied out weakly to left. And Lidge was lights out in the ninth.

And I was delirious. It's a good thing the Giants game was over and that most of the bar had cleared out, cause that meant I had room to jump around and pump my fist without hurting anyone. And I still can't believe we won. I keep checking the scoreboards and the highlights to make sure that it really happened, that they didn't decide in the middle of the night to take it away.

It's crazy, all of it. But Mark was right. So is October.

"Have a little phaith." --John Hiatt

Better yet, have a lot.

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Other Musings:

When the Phils got Stairs, I liked the move, and I remember sending the story to a couple of friends. Here's an e-mail I got this morning from my friend Scott:

"So when the Phils got Stairs I remember you being really excited (i think it was that acquisition) and I said to you something like "relax, he's a utility player, they rarely make the difference, he's not the contact hitter we need nor is he the answer to our problems..." Well, all it takes is one swing to make you right...and right you were, so I'm giving you props - for one night (the most important night of our season so far) he was the man...and the difference. Wow, what a game."

Anyone notice how the Eagles and Phillies just cannot win in the same day? Good news for everyone, the Birds are on their bye this week. And with the Eagles hanging on to win, we gained a game on everyone in the division, who all lost to teams they probably should've beaten.

Does anyone really like these Old Spice ads? First of all, just what is that whistle? Is that supposed to be catchy, to get in my head and make me want to buy the product? Then you've got that Robert Goulet wannabe butchering Hungry Like the Wolf at the piano, while scantily clad girls are taking turns saying, "Ahoy." Ahoy?!? What the hell is that? Are we 17th century Englishmen on a ship that's just come in sight of landfall? Not the last time I checked. And now we've got this guy who's a half-man, half-horse, and it's supposed to be funny cause he's "two great things in one" but no one's mentioning that he's a horse. I don't know about you, but I can't imagine being half-man, half-horse is a good thing. Am I supposed to be jealous? Am I supposed to think, "Yeah, that would be cool to be half-horse!"? Cause I don't. The fact that this campaign was ever hatched is only beaten by the fact that it's still going. So, I'm done with Old Spice products. If good commercials are supposed to make you want to buy the product, I'm boycotting products whose commercials piss me off.