Tampa Once Again

Phils to face off against Tampa on Wednesday night



I don't even have to utter the words "Tampa Bay" without most of you remembering the most horrific defeat in modern Philadelphia sports memory. Yes, I'm talking about The Debacle I-otherwise known as the 2003 NFC Championship game.

The date was January 17, 2003 and the week prior to it we as Eagles Nation felt that we had this game in the bag. We were already packing our bags and reserving hotel rooms for the Super Bowl.

The stars were aligned that year. Last game at the Vet. The Bucs were a woeful 1-30 in games under 40 degrees and we owned them in previous playoff meetings.

The game started off in wonderful fashion with Brian Mitchell returning a punt down near the red zone and Duce capped things off with a TD. And, then things went downhill from there once Joe Jurevicious took a reception for 70 yards down the field swinging the mometum the other way. And, the game got worse and worse and worse-it was like watching a relative die from cancer.

But, we were still alive even when it was 20-10 and McNabb led us down the field with a few minutes left. Finally we were put out of misery when Ronde Barber returned McNabb's pass attempt all the way down the field to end the game 27-10.

That game stole my innocence as a sports fan. I was never the same again. I still remember 1993 and it hurt, but this one really hurt because that year the Eagles should have won a Super Bowl. They were a better team that Tampa and would've beat Oakland.

And, a year later the Flyers tormented us by taking the Tampa Bay Lightning to the brink, but they couldn't win in Tampa. The home team won each game in that Conference Finals series with Tampa winning in seven and going on to win it all.

Now, with Boston losing last night we have to look forward to another matchup with a Tampa team. And, I don't like it at all.

I know I'm not supposed to be a negadelphian and be positive, expect the best because the Phillies have so far done the unthinkable.

That's fine and good, but my heart has been broken so many times I take every playoff series with a grain of salt and enjoy the ride.

But, I don't expect anything and especially when it comes to one our teams playing a Tampa team.

What makes matters worse is the Tampa fans are the phoniest, biggest front-running fans known to man. They were drawing about 7,000 people per game when they stunk and their attendance sucked for much of the year.

Case in point, let's take a sample of their attendance AFTER they became a good team this year.

Friday May 6th against the White Sox, they drew slightly under 15,000 people. And, this was on a Friday night game!

August 6th against the Indians they drew 27,500 against the Indians during a Wednesday game. That's about 75% capacity.

September 2nd during the heat of a pennant race against the Yankees, they drew slightly less than 22,000 people! How pathetic is that?

Only did their attendance get good down the stretch in September when they played the Red Sox.

They were 100% full against the Sox on September 17th.

No matter what happens though I expect this one to go seven games. As I wrote last week, Shields, Kazmir, and Garza are as strong of a one, two, three punch you'll see in the bigs.

And, the offense is no joke either. Upton is hitting lights out along with Evan Longoria. Carl Crawford is a 5-tool player and a terror on the basepaths.

Both teams have until 10:00 Wednesday morning to set their World Series rosters.