MY FAVORITE THINGS OF 2008 (BESIDES GETTING ENGAGED)

FAVORITE THING: Phillies winning the World Series

FAVORITE SPORTS THING: Phillies winning the World Series

FAVORITE TV SHOW: Broadcasts of the Phillies winning the World Series

FAVORITE BOOK: A book about the Phillies winning the World Series

FAVORITE MOVIE: (tie) The Dark Knight and the Phillies World Series DVD¹

FAVORITE SONG: "We Are The Champions" by Queen, played at the Phillies World Series parade

FAVORITE ALBUM: Wire, Object 47²

FAVORITE WINNER OF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION: Cole Hamels

¹The Phillies World Series DVD is better
²Special "Phillies World Series" Edition

UPDATE: They totally made it in!

I've never seen a series of increasingly unlikely playoff scenarios break in Philly's way as perfectly as today! I may never see such a thing again! What a completely incredibly awesome thing!

Forget everything I said about them not belonging in the playoffs. This totally rules. I'm excited.

Thank you Raiders, thank you Texans, let's go Eagles!

One more "Go Eagles" for the road

By now we now all the playoff scenarios. The Eagles need to win today, but before that, they need Tampa Bay to lose to Oakland, plus either Minnesota or Chicago to lose (or preferably both, because I'm feeling vindictive). Sadly, the problem is that those other games will be over by the time of the Eagles game, so the Eagles game might therefore become meaningless. (Except for the Cowboys, but I wouldn't give a crap what happens to them at that point.)

Part of me feels like these Eagles don't deserve a playoff spot, not after the two terrible losses to Washington this year, or that wretched game in Baltimore (arguably the worst game I've ever seen) or the idiotic tie (arguably the worst game I've ever missed because I was out with my in-laws). I'm both eager and terrified to see what changes happen to this franchise - my fear is that they'll take the easy way out and just get of McNabb, my hope is that they'll get him some decent receivers for a change and make one last ditch effort to win with him.

But hey, it's Week 17, and I feel like I'm not quite ready to say goodbye to football, so today let's just root for the Raiders, Giants, Texans, and Eagles, and we'll figure out what it all means later.

GO EAGLES!

ANNOUNCEMENT

There comes a time in every young man's life when he has to come to terms with the fact that he'll probably never be Kristen Schaal's boyfriend.

In that spirit, the other day I asked Sharon to marry me and she said yes.

Seriously, though, I'm quite ecstatic about this. I mean, look at me - the Phils won the World Series, and this is the thing that happened to me in 2008 that I'm most excited about! I'll take the World Series of course (because, seriously, how great was that?), but I've done a lot of thinking lately and have realized that there's more to life than the fortunes of 25 rich young men I've never met. Especially when you've got someone as great as Sharon. I'm an impossibly lucky man. I hope I never stop appreciating that.

I've been neglecting this blog too much, and though I'll be extremely busy in 2009 I don't plan on giving up on it. The boys have a title to defend, and I'll be there for every moment of it, wedding or not. But after winning the Series, and with my life now changing for the better, baseball is going to be different for me from now on - not better, not worse, just something else, and I don't know what yet. We'll figure it out together.

I'll have at least one more post in 2008 but let me send out my fondest wishes to everyone for an excellent holiday season and a fantastic, peaceful new year. Make it a great one, I know I will.

(Oh yeah, and I won my fantasy football league for the second year in a row, that was awesome too.)

Today's rant, and then I really should go do something productive

I only follow the NBA because I love the Sixers. I say this because it's become clear to me that it's a messed up league and if I ever have any excuse to stop following it I will probably grab that excuse and run with it. To put it another way: if you told me I'm only allowed to follow a maximum of four sports and that I would have to drop one in order to follow the new soccer team, I'd drop the NBA. I really would, which breaks my heart because, again, I love the Sixers, but it wouldn't be their fault really. They'd be the unfortunate victims here. My ire is rather directed at the league as a whole. First of all there's David Stern, who might be a literally evil man. Then there's the whole debacle with the SuperSonics, which still leaves a really bad taste in my mouth and makes me hate myself for giving the league money. And then there's this whole nonsense with everyone speculating about where LeBron James will be in 2010 - it's just offensive to me that people are more interested in what's going to happen in the league a year and a half from now than they are in watching games that are actually happening at this exact moment. But ultimately, I think my unease of late has more to do with the league's extreme and almost absurd lack of parity. Take a look at the current standings. You've got FIVE teams who are 10 or more games under .500. TEN games!!! Throw in Golden State and Memphis, each at 5-14, and that's seven teams with appallingly terrible records. Now, I know that's there's always going to be bottom-feeders and doormats in every league, but SEVEN of them? That's almost a quarter of the league. Why do these teams exist, when it's obvious that there aren't enough quality, NBA-level players to fill them? How do they take money from their fans with a straight face?

In the past, I was never one to blame expansion, partially because I have this weird, nerdy fascination with expansion teams, and the movement/addition of franchises in general, but as I've gotten older I realize that it's really the problem. (Most likely not a great idea in soccer, either, but I'm going to just ignore that for now.) I think the league would be considerably stronger if you ditched like six of these teams. A 24-team NBA would rock. But what six teams? I don't know, and unfortunately my favorite team is one of those teams currently at the bottom in attendance, so it would be pretty hypocritical of me to suggest folding, say, the Clippers, wouldn't it?

I've been grappling with the problem of the Sixers' low attendance for a while now. They didn't even sell out their playoff games back in April, which still just amazes and saddens me. I went to all three of them and it was just embarrassing seeing all those empty seats - in the playoffs! But I think, maybe, that I'm not the only one who has noticed the league's almost epic lack of parity, and most Philadelphians just didn't believe that a team like the Sixers - a good, fun team last spring, but not a real contender - had any chance against the likes of the Celtics/Lakers/Pistons, et al.

Which reminds me, take a look at those standings again. Conversely, there are teams on top like Boston, LA, and Cleveland, who are winning like 85% or more of their games, and are unbeatable to the point where you have to just kind of catch them on a bad night, and get lucky, to even have a shot. Does it really benefit the league to have a bunch of unstoppable monsters like that playing games against the doormats? Would you watch a Celtics (19-2) vs. Thunder (2-18) game? What would be the point?

Actually, the main reason I'm pissed off is because I'm still not over the fact that the Celtics were one of the league's worst teams in 2006-07, and then suddenly won the championship in 2007-08, and nobody is brave enough to stand up and say that it's obvious they got that good so quickly because they acquired one of the best players in the league from Minnesota, whose GM is Kevin McHale, a former Celtic, and if the league had any guts it would investigate the fact that it was a crappy, fake, lopsided trade and McHale was just trying to help his former team, and anyone who argues differently is a douchebag. So, yes, this entire lengthy post was just an excuse, ultimately, for me to complain about a Boston team. And you know what? It was worth it. Die, Boston, die!!!