Fans follow sports for more than talent and teamwork, statistics and stud athletes.
There is a certain mystique about sport in general: A drama or story line that plays itself out with every great athlete, team and even city. It is the reason that underdogs can pull off upsets, and how an entire town can suffer from a sports curse.
It's these kinds of stories-behind-the-stories that make sports interesting, even to those who don't care who wins and loses.
Philadelphia is rooting for its Flyers to win the Stanley Cup Championship, and possibly prove that the curse of William Penn really was broken with the Phillies' 2008 World Series title.
The city's founder was said to have put a curse on its major professional sports teams in 1987, when a skyscraper (One Liberty Place) was built to be taller than the William Penn statue at the top of Philadelphia City Hall.
For nearly 20 years, Philly sports teams had suffered a series of 'close but no cigar' playoff runs, ending just shy of a championship, and breaking the hearts of Philadelphia sports fans. The Phillies lost the 1993 World Series, the 76ers fell in the 2001 NBA finals, and the Eagles lost the NFC title games in 2001, '02 and '03, and then fell in the 2004 Super Bowl, just to name a few of the narrow-but-dramatic failures.
The City of Brotherly Love felt like the city of almost-champions, and you know what they say, "close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades."
But things seem to have turned around for the home of the Liberty Bell, America's best cheesesteaks and Rocky Balboa.
The Phillies have advanced to back-to-back World Series, winning in 2008. Just this past week, Roy Halladay became only the second pitcher in Phillies history to pitch a perfect game, an amazing moment in Philadelphia and national sports, giving the city another reason to celebrate.
Now the Flyers are in the hunt for the Stanley Cup Championship. Many fans in Central Pa. are die-hard Pittsburgh Penguin faithful, and series cross-state rivals, but it would be a great story line to have the Stanley Cup stay in Pennsylvania for another year.
Some would say that the recent turn-around for Philly teams is the result of construction workers in 2007 placing a small William Penn statute on the final beam of the new Comcast Center, now the tallest building in the city.
Others might say the string of Philly failures in sports was the result of some bad coaching, bad management, bad judgment, bad attitudes or just plain bad luck.
Superstition comes with the mystique of sport, so we're left to make up our own minds.
If the Red Sox can break the curse of the Bambino, and the White Sox can shake the Cures of the Black Sox, then perhaps Philadelphia has outlived the curse of William Penn.
Kellie can be reached at kellie@bedfordcountychamber.org. Her column appears on Tuesdays.
