This city can handle frustrating roster-building moves, and it can certainly handle losing. The constant barrage it’s come in this fall and winter is quite a lot to process.
It hasn’t just been a bad week
for the Sixers, who capped off a 1-3 week by blowing a 10-point fourth quarter lead to an Eastern Conference rival. If anything, it’s been rougher on the other local ball clubs.
The Eagles’ title defense fell flat on its face in the first round of the NFL playoffs. A season’s worth of offensive frustration culminating in an extremely winnable loss to the San Francisco 49ers.
After three straight playoff flameouts, the Phillies appeared poised to finally shake up their lineup by adding infielder Bo Bichette, who just played a big role in Toronto Blue Jays’ run to the World Series. Not only did the Phillies fail to sign Bichette, but he ended up signing with the hated New York Mets.
I don’t really follow hockey at all but I see that the Flyers have now lost five games in a row as well.
This is not even the first week from hell Philadelphia sports fans have suffered in the past 6 months. Back in mid-October, the Phillies were eliminated by the Los Angeles Dodgers in the playoffs, the walk-off play being a bone-headed play by relief pitcher Orion Kerkering errantly coming home with a comebacker as opposed to getting the easy out at first base.
That very same night, the Eagles suffered a humiliating loss to another division rival, the New York Giants. They didn’t just lose to a team that would win four games all season, but were run off the field in a 34-17 blowout.
The nice thing about having four sports team in your city is when one frustrates you, there’s normally another one getting their season underway or kicking into gear to distract you from that.
As someone who not just blogs about the Sixers, but covers them, I’ve detached myself from rooting for them. That certainly isn’t the case for those other two teams.
Back on Oct. 9, the day of Game 4 of the NLDS and the Thursday Night Football matchup, I was dying for that Eagles game to kick off. Like so many, I was skeptical of the Phils being successful on their third attempt at running it back, and when they were already on the brink of elimination, I was just ready for it to be over.
It might be unfair to lump the Sixers in with this for just losing three games in an 82-game season, all of which to playoff teams. That’s nothing compared to the existential problem of an aging roster, or one that just seems to not like each other.
While I was already watching the Sixers take on the Raptors because it’s my job, I’m sure there were many ready to flip right over once the Eagles offense embarrassingly fizzled out in the second half at home against the Niners. After getting through an Eagles season that was miserable from the very first week, fans could immediately switch over to see the Sixers fumble a game in both regulation and overtime to the Toronto Raptors, a team they’re neck and neck with in the Eastern Conference standings.
After rebounding with a win in the follow-up to Toronto, they were still winners of seven of their last 10 games and had two nationally televised games to show both their fans and the larger NBA audience reason to feel good about this franchise again.
They might have gotten smoked by the Cleveland Cavaliers, in the first matchup, but they had an opportunity to get them right back on Friday. With the Cavs down Darius Garland, it was the perfect chance to give the city a palette cleanser after the Bichette news broke earlier in the day. Phillies fans especially needed the Sixers to get a win, to have something to point at to say, “at least it’s not all bad.”
For so long it looked like they would pull out the win the city needed. Joel Embiid was in complete control offensively as he dropped 33 points, and the Sixers built a 10-point lead in the fourth. That quickly crumbled though, giving the Sixers another frustrating loss at the buzzer — that lead gone along with any hope of reprieve from this miserable week.
Look, this is just a Sixers blog, I get that. Maybe you don’t care about the Eagles (God bless you), the Phillies (seriously good call), or the Flyers (no, that’s a great call, though.) This city is built by 4-for-4s though.
For anyone who falls in that sort of boat, the pain these teams caused haven’t just been frequent, it’s been relentless.
