With their own postseason bid coming down to the final week of the season, the Philadelphia Phillies have officially earned the much chagrined superlative of owning the longest active playoff drought across Major League Baseball. Ironically, in the midst of a hurricane, we are speaking of droughts.
The Seattle Mariners punched their tickets to the American League Wild Card Series on Friday night, defeating the Oakland Athletics 2-1. The Mariners’ berth into the MLB playoffs snaps 21-year drought, the longest across all major North American sports.
The NBA’s Sacramento Kings now own the longest active drought across professional sports, a 16-year drought dating back to the 2005-06 season in which they lost to the San Antonio Spurs.
The Phillies drought
Philadelphia, meanwhile, now owns the ‘honor’ in Major League Baseball. It’s been 11 years since the prime days of Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Jimmy Rollins, and Chase Utley.
With six games remaining in the season and a magic number sitting at five, the Phillies can still pass the baton down to the next longest drought this season (Mike Trout’s Los Angeles Angels) but they may need some help to do so as the Milwaukee Brewers are only 0.5 games back in the standings. Additionally, the Washington Nationals are not making it easy to get their series in as Hurricane Ian remnants rain down.
The Mariners were not the only team to secure their playoff berth on Friday night as well as the Tampa Bay Rays defeated the Houston Astros to claim the final seat in the American League playoffs, eliminating the Baltimore Orioles.
Ironically, if the Phillies do make their return to the postseason, they will likely start where they left off in 2011: Busch Stadium. The Phillies will have to face the St. Louis Cardinals in the best-of-three Wild Card round in which the Cardinals would play host to all three games.
With the memory of Ryan Howard’s torn Achilles tendon on the final play of 2011 still fresh in the minds of many Philadelphians, perhaps the Phillies will finally have the chance to replace that dreaded memory with one of victory.
Photo Credit: AP Photo/Nick Wass
