Philly Paper Curses the Phillies

Philadelphia Inquirer runs ad calling Phils 2009 World Champions; may have a Yankee fan on staff

By TERESA MASTERSON and HASANI GITTENS

Updated 3:12 PM EST, Mon, Nov 2, 2009

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In an unexplained blunder that many sports fans would call ominous, the Philadelphia Inquirer ran a huge Macy’s ad on the back of the main section today congratulating the Phillies for being "back-to-back World Series champions."

It comes the morning after Game 4’s crushing defeat by the Yankees, putting the Phillies behind 3-1 in the series.

The ad, which takes up most of the newspaper's back page, states, “Congratulations Phillies! Back-to-Back Champs," with a photo of a T-shirt bearing the words, “Philadelphia Phillies 2009 World Series Champions,” Macy’s directs Philadelphians to show their Phillies pride and “celebrate their World Series Win” by buying a shirt.

Hah! Good luck!

The Macy's ad was not the only baseball-inspired flub on the page. The article next to the ad had the name "Alexrod" (as in the Yankees' Alex Rodriguez) instead of "Axelrod."

This T-shirt was part of the Macy's ad in the Inquirer, congratulating the Phillies on a back-to-back World Series Championship

Baseball being one of the most superstitious sports there is, the ad and its gray T-shirt looms over the back page and the Phillies like an big black cloud.

How this happened is yet to be known. The Inquirer didn't explain the mistake, but they did offer an apology.

In a statement, Howard Griffin, Vice President of National Advertising for the Inquirer said: "A Macy’s advertisement in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer incorrectly offered Phillies 2009 World Championship merchandise. The Inquirer deeply regrets this error. Macy’s is a great corporate citizen, supporter of this region and our sports teams. We apologize for this error and any
inconvenience this caused."

Given the character of most Philadelphia sports fans, Mr. Griffin might want to go into the witness protection program for a while.

Anyone with knowledge of the ins and outs of a newspaper knows that it’s the job of a copyeditor to go through each layout page, making sure editorial and advertising copy are grammatically and contextually correct.

But whoever was in charge of proofing page A20 was obviously asleep at the keyboard. Or, great conspiracy theorists might say that there is a Yankee fan on the Inquirer staff:

Next to the offending ad is an article that should have the headline “Limbaugh, Axelrod Trade Jabs.” Instead, the second blooper on the same page reads: “Limbaugh, Alexrod Trade Jobs.” As in, Alex Rodriguez, not David Axelrod.

Somebody did have the Yankees on his mind.