Philadelphia Phillies manager Rob Thomson is building a love story with the city’s fans.
There are few cities as passionate and fiery about their sports teams as Philadelphia.
As the Phillies keep getting unexpected success in the postseason, Thomson’s legend keeps growing and growing.
Phillies fans completely packed Citizens Bank Park for Friday’s Game 3 against the Atlanta Braves.
Players were cheered and applauded, but the loudest ovation was for Thomson.
“Phillies manager Rob Thomson got one of the loudest standing ovations. He says for 58 years no one knew who he was. Last night when he banged the drum at the Flyers game, he said everyone was coming up to him. ‘I really got a sense of the electricity in the air in the city,’” NBCS’s John Clark tweeted, with some Thomson quotes.
Phillies manager Rob Thomson got one of the loudest standing ovations
He says for 58 years no one knew who he was. Last night when he banged the drum at the Flyers game, he said everyone was coming up to him
“I really got a sense of the electricity in the air in the city” pic.twitter.com/X07r3adxOT
— John Clark (@JClarkNBCS) October 14, 2022
You can feel the city loves him.
An Intense Love Affair
The affair actually started in June: the Phillies had just fired struggling manager Joe Girardi, and appointed Thomson as the interim skipper.
All he did was turn around the Phils’ season, get a 65-46 record (good for a .586 winning percentage) and make sure the franchise went to the playoffs for the first time since 2011.
That’s a nice start, isn’t it?
Then he proceeded to sweep the NL Central champs, the St. Louis Cardinals, in the Wild Card round.
He has the reigning World Series champions Atlanta Braves against the wall: the series is 1-1, but Game 3, at the moment of writing this article, had Philadelphia up 9-1.
If the Phils end up taking Game 3, they will have the perfect chance to knock out Atlanta in front of their home crowd on Sunday.
All thanks to Thomson.
NEXT: Must-See Video Shows Phillies Fans In Full Force For Game 3