The Phillies of 1993 had precious little home-grown talent. They were a collection of castoffs, cheap pickups, and well-traveled veterans with little pedigree, and little connection to the town that now reveres them. They hung together, drank together, spit out vicious insults to each other as if they were sunflower seeds. They were their own community, like a minor league team is.
Few had been to the postseason. Few, if they were honest, expected to be there when the season began.
The 2008 Phillies expect to be there. They are defending National League East champions, a title forged by more than a month's worth of playoff-like baseball. You can see that in the way they play right now, in the way they take big hits and keep coming at you, by the way they close the deal and own ninth innings. You can even see it by the way they talk. Before you can come down from the high they just gave you, they're talking about tomorrow's game.
The '93 team was a hope more than a plan, which is why it dissipated so quickly. You hoped Darren Daulton's surgically repaired knees would handle the grind. You hoped Lenny Dykstra would stay off the disabled list and play more than 85 games. You hoped Danny Jackson's shoulder and elbow would hold up and that Jim Eisenreich could handle big-city pressure and that Pete Incaviglia, after a promising comeback year with Houston, had something left in the tank.
You hoped that Ben Rivera's strong August and September in 1992 was a harbinger for 1993 and that Curt Schilling wouldn't revert back to the pitcher he was before 1992, the pitcher who had already been through three organizations before the Phillies.
