It will happen any day now.

Maybe this weekend, or maybe next week, the Philadelphia Phillies, the all-time losingest franchise in the history of professional sports, will lose their 10,000th game.  And when they do, Phillies fans will march:  not in protest, but in a parade.

What inspires the most beleaguered fan base in sports – not only have the Phillies won only one World Series in their 125-year history, but Philadelphia has gone longer without a championship (24 years and counting, since the 76ers in 1983) than any other city with teams in the four major sports – to celebrate such an ignominious milestone?

Trust me, it’s not that we enjoy losing.  Not every Phillies loss is gut-wrenchingly painful – it’s probably no more than 80 or 90 percent – but none of them are pleasant.

We don’t find losing endearing, either.  No one has ever labeled the Phillies “lovable losers.”

But all those losses – and fortunately, I’m young enough that I’ve only felt the sting of about a quarter of that ten grand – have taught us something.  They’ve toughened us.  They’ve tested us.  Indeed, I believe being a Phillies fan has made me a better human being.

It has taught me about loyalty when there is no rational basis for said loyalty.  Since leaving Philadelphia nearly 18 years ago, I have lived in cities where the home teams – the St. Louis Cardinals and the Boston Red Sox – inspired notoriously loyal fan bases in their own right.  Indeed, many people assumed that after all those years in St. Louis, I would have adopted the Cardinals as my own and abandoned those losers from my hometown.  But I never did.  It never even occurred to me.  I was born a Phillies fan, and no matter what city in the world I might call home, I would remain a Phillies fan.  Through thick and thin (though mostly thin), the Phillies taught me what it means to love unconditionally, even if the object of your love only occasionally loves you back.

Cheering for the Phillies has taught me about faith, and perseverance, and patience.  I am fortunate enough to have lived through that lone World Series win, in 1980, and perhaps that magical run to the title is what helps me keep the faith.  But whether it’s the fuzzy memories of Tug McGraw leaping off the mound, or a delusional belief that even in a sport with no salary cap and no significant revenue sharing, on Opening Day, every team has as good a chance as any other, I believe that once again, and in my lifetime, the Phillies can win it all.  And if I have to wait another 27 years (and at this rate, this looks like a very real possibility), I will wait another 27 years.  I can be patient.  I mean, really, what are my other options?

Perhaps most importantly, being a Phillies fan has taught me about resiliency, and bouncing back from devastating emotional heartbreak.  One of the all-time great home runs in baseball history was hit by Joe Carter of the Toronto Blue Jays in the 1993 World Series.  Against the Phillies.  Never before had anybody hit a come-from-behind, World-Series-winning home run.  Until then.  But did the franchise disappear?  Did the stadium crumble?  Did the players give up?  Did the fans give in?  No.  We mourned for a while, but then we came back for more heartbreak, risking emotional vulnerability on the off chance that the next time, it might turn out differently.  Over that long winter, we realized collectively that even though we were destined to see highlights of that home run replayed for the rest of our lives, that even though people now only needed to utter the words “Joe Carter” to immediately summon images of our crushing defeat, the world did not end with that home run.  Yes, in that particular instance, at that particular moment, the World Series did end, but the world did not.  We would live to cheer another day.

And so we approach 10,000 losses, a sure thing in a lifetime full of hopes dashed.

Would we have liked a few more wins here and there?  Sure.  But ask any group of true Phillies fans if they would rather be fans of another team, perhaps one that wins a little more often, like, say, the Yankees – they of the 26 World Series titles – and you won’t find a single taker.  In fact, I feel sorry for Yankees fans.  What do they know from the reality of losing?  When is their mettle tested?  When are they challenged to prove their loyalty?  I hear Yankees fans complain about not winning a World Series since 2000, and I laugh.  Winning has made them soft.

Do we think maybe we deserve a little more respect for our suffering, the kind of sympathy and adoration heaped on teams like the Cubs and the Red Sox in recent years?  Sure.  But we won’t go groveling for it.

We’ll just keep cheering for our Phillies, booing them when appropriate (and with 10,000 losses in sight, surely you must concede that at times it’s highly appropriate), checking the box scores, and waiting patiently for our fortunes to change.

I mean, really, what are our other options?