"You and I Have Unfinished Business..."

Philadelphia and Tampa Bay have unfinished business. Not in the, “I left some TPS Reports to finish on Monday,” kind of way. No. Philly and Tampa have Beatrix Kiddo and Bill kind of unfinished business.

This is an epic tale of revenge. Philadelphia has been a tortured sports city for a quarter of a century now, and some of the most recent of those tortures have come at the hands of Tampa Bay. The Buccaneers shocked the powerhouse Eagles in 2003 en route to a Super Bowl XXVII Championship and the Lightning crushed the spirit of a resurgent Flyers in the 2004 Eastern Conference Final.

Both of those instances where not run-of-the-mill losses, they were Shakespearian tragedies. Anyone who says they don’t remember the excitement of Brian Mitchell’s opening kickoff return and the subsequent heartbreak brought on by Joe Jurevicius and Ronde Barber are either lying or have blocked the pain out of their heads through intensive therapy, medication, or both.

The Flyers, meanwhile, beat-up and tired from two grueling series with rivals New Jersey and Toronto were able to push the top-seeded Lightning to a Game 7. The team looked lackluster at times throughout the playoffs, and team captain Keith Primeau put the Flyers on his back in a playoff performance for the ages. After Simon Gagne’s overtime goal in Game 6, it looked like these Flyers were due for a miracle finish, after all, they had made the usually unshakable Nikolai Khabibulin look human. They fell short, however, as the Lightning squeaked out a 2-1 victory in Game 7 and went on to beat the Calgary Flames for the Stanley Cup and promptly held a parade for six people in some parking lot.

But it could all be redeemed if the Phillies put the Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique on the Rays in the World Series. For this likable, home-grown group of guys to exorcise the Tampa demons of years past is almost too exciting to think about. Hamels, Utley, Rollins, Howard, and Lidge could win it for McNabb, Primeau, Roenick, Dawkins, and all our past heroes that failed to take home the Big Prize because of those cocky Florida upstarts.

For most of this decade, it seemed the road of Philly redemption ran through Tampa Bay. This truly is a date with destiny, we always knew it was going to end this way, but now we have to write our own ending. This city needs closure and we have to beat a familiar foe to get there.

With apologies to Michael Madsen, we deserve our revenge. And they... they deserve to die.