Eagles

Ten Things I’m Thankful For in Philadelphia Sports: 2025 Edition

By Nick Piccone

Published: Nov 26th, 2025 · 9:34 AM EST

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Who has it worse than Philadelphia sports fans? Our 8-3 football team has vibes lower than a 5-5-1 team. Our baseball team underachieved again. Our soccer team overachieved and then ripped the rug out from under us in classic Union fashion. Our basketball team is rebuilding while in the middle of some insane contracts. Our hockey team plays from October through April, and that’s it.

Temple Football has collapsed. The Big 5 doesn’t excite anyone anymore. Where is the Philadelphia Soul when you need them?

But today, we’re going to forget all that… at least we’re going to try. We’re going to look at the positives in Philly sports, because as insane as we can be on a day-to-day basis, there is objectively a lot to be thankful for.

Let’s hit it. Note: These are in no particular order, but I feel more strongly as the list goes.

10. Bryce Harper

I think a few of us have taken Bryce Harper’s presence for granted recently. I’m certainly guilty of it. There are issues on the surface that just paint a weird vibe. Dave Dombrowski’s comments after the season ended didn’t help any, and neither did Harper’s reaction. I know they’re both playing a game off the field, but I always try to not forget the biggest reason we have baseball to care about today. When people try to insert Gabe Kapler’s name into the turn of this Phillies’ era, I cringe. It’s all Harper. That’s why his struggles can be the most glaring. But as long as he’s here and playing at a high level, this team isn’t going to fade away into obscurity.

9. Daniel Vladar

Now, you might say, “Who?”, but I say Vladař is a huge reason why it’s fun to watch the Flyers in this early season. Eight wins in 13 games with a 2.42 GAA and a .912 save percentage – pinch me! He might not be the franchise goalie of the future, but he’s more than cemented as the better goalie of the Vladař/Ersson duo. You see a more confident team playing in front of Vladař than you do Ersson. The Flyers may still be rebuilding, but they’re no longer a chore to watch.

8. Dave Leno

The voice of the Philadelphia Union has you thinking the biggest call of his career is the most current one. Leno brings it every single game to make whatever you’re watching the most important game in franchise history. If you can feel Scott Franzke’s emotion through his calls, you can sure as hell feel Leno’s emotions.

7. Scott Franzke

Speaking of Franzke, he lands on this list yearly – if I made a yearly list. We’ve all said it before – there’s nothing like Franzke and LA in the summer. And if you listened to the radio broadcast during the Phils’ Game 3 win in LA, you’d think it was Game 7 of the World Series. Franzke, simply put, delivers. Every night.

6. Kyle Schwarber

I’m trying hard not to cloud the last few weeks of the season in my judgment of Kyle Schwarber. What an incredible season he had in 2025. Even though I’m not so sure he’s a slam-dunk to return anymore, it was fun as hell watching him clobber 56 dingers.

5. the Sixers backcourt

With Joel Embiid’s prime in the rear-view mirror, the vibes surrounding the Sixers hadn’t felt this low in close to a decade. Enter VJ Edgecombe. With the mark Jared McCain made last season before his injury, to Tyrese Maxey’s 2025 start, and Edgecombe’s incredible pro debut, it created an atmosphere surrounding the team that could make them fun to watch again. And they’ve delivered. They’re not championship contenders, but they don’t have to be this year. Hopefully they’ll grow into a solid-to-above-average core for this team moving forward before they eventually graduate to championship contenders again.

4. Zack Wheeler

The Phillies had one of, if not the, best starting rotations in baseball in 2025. Wheeler was obviously a huge part of that before his season was taken away from him. We haven’t seen a pitcher dominate the way Wheeler has since Roy Halladay. He may pitch every five days, but make no mistake, he’s absolutely a member of this squad’s core. Hopefully we’ll see some of the old Wheeler when he returns, but the prime No. 1 starter days are likely over.

3. QB1

The discourse surrounding this Eagles team after they won the Super Bowl is truly something to behold. We, as fans, have been waiting for an era of the Eagles to be as elite as this one is. Two Super Bowls in three years, and they were very close to winning both of them. Jalen Hurts isn’t the best quarterback in the NFL, but for some reason, I hear people trying to downplay his role on this team because they want people to think they’re smarter than they actually are. And we’ve heard so many different stories from different sources that it’s hard to take a lot of the reporting at face value. I won’t say reporters are lying, but consider the source of these reports. Why is someone talking to them anonymously? It’s usually the one who has something they need to vent on. Sometimes there’s more than one. And sometimes that person vents directly to the media and still gets vilified for it. 

The one constant is QB1. Super Bowl MVP. I could not possibly care less if he’s not a top five QB in the league. Look at his record. Look at what he does when his team needs him to perform. Not just the last handful of games. That doesn’t tell the story some of the Negadelphians want it to tell. It’s just so transparently convenient to focus on a singular aspect to drive an agenda. The expectations have certainly increased as success mounts, but some of the current propaganda out there is ridiculous.

2. Howie Roseman’s motivation

Every general manager has to make moves beneath the surface to round out their rosters. Howie’s made some great moves, and he’s made some not-so-great moves. The difference is we can tell Roseman does his best to work with what he has not only during the off-season, but in-season as well. Some of them don’t work out (Kevin Byard, Za’Darius Smith, etc.), and some do (Ndamukong Suh, Linval Joseph). It gets harder and harder to land great players in the draft when you’re constantly picking at the end of the first round. Nobody is more creative right now than Roseman. And he’s not afraid to swing and miss and take another hack unlike other GMs.

1. Another championship

The City of Philadelphia added another professional sports championship to its resumé this year. That’s three in my lifetime that I’ve gotten to celebrate with all of you. There’s simply no other feeling like it as a sports fan. I can’t believe I was actually bored watching Super Bowl LIX. It was AWESOME. The high of the celebration makes the lows of the heartbreaks worth it entirely. That’s why we’re here. That’s why we’ll stay here. The haters have moved from “no rings” to “catch up to us” in the most hilarious pivot in human sports fan history. They are all down bad. And we are thankful for that.