by Chris Messner

Created on: November 01, 2009

Regardless of the outcome of the 2009 World Series, the Philadelphia Phillies can lay claim to being one of the year's best sports teams. In fact, the Phillies have been one of baseball's best teams for 3 years running.

Some history: The Phillies are an old and storied franchise, but they're better known for losing more games than any other team, than for claiming championships. The Phillies are baseball's all-time losing-est team, and were the first team to lose 10,000 games. And, until 2008, believe it or not, the Phillies had captured only one World Series crown, back in 1980, against the Kansas City Royals. Wow!

But that all began to change in 2007. That year, with the New York Mets favored to cruise to the National League East division championship, the Phils persevered and battled all the way to the end of the season as the Mets staged one of the most monumental chokes in major-league history, playing like frightened little kids and blowing a 7-game division lead with less than 2 weeks to go in the season. The Phillies went out in the first round of playoffs against the Colorado Rockies, but were primed to repeat as contenders in 2008.

The Mets wilted again in '08, blowing a smaller lead than in '07. The Fightin' Phils surged in September, almost single-handedly carried for nearly the entire month by Ryan Howard, who had compiled a mediocre year - until the final month of the season. How he was overlooked as the 2008 National League Most Valuable Player still mystifies me. No way the Phillies would have made the playoffs without him that last month.

The team paid Howard back by knocking off the Milwaukee Brewers and Los Angeles Dodgers to get to the World Series to face the Tampa Bay Rays, making their first World Series appearance. Although 4 of the 5 World Series games were close, the Phils were not going to be denied their second World Championship in team history.

In 2009, the Phillies had a relatively easy time winning the NL East, then knocked off the Rockies and Dodgers in the playoffs to become the first National League team in over 30 years (since the '77-'78 Dodgers) to play in 2 consecutive World Series. As of this writing, the 2009 Series is tied at one win apiece, with the Phils hosting the Yankees tonight for Game 3.

During their 3-year surge, the core of the Phillies has been composed of Jimmy Rollins, Ryan Howard, Jason Werth, Shane Victorino and Chase Utley on offense, and Cole Hamels and Jamie Moyer on the mound, led by manager Charlie Manuel, a baseball veteran who was something of a minor-league slugger, but flopped as a major-leaguer. The combination of the players' self-motivation plus Manuel's encouragement and guidance has made the Phillies what a big-league team should be: Respectful of the game, playing hard, hungry and with the right attitude.

I'm a Mets fan, but I have all the respect and admiration in the world for the Phillies because they epitomize, year after year, how a winning team should play, and what can be accomplished by combining perseverance, talent, performance, and a winning attitude. The current version of my team is talented, but sorely lacking in other, perhaps more important, characteristics.

My hat's off to the Philadelphia Phillies, one of 2009's best sports teams.

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