Top 28 Philadelphia Sports GIFs of the Year

It was not a good year for Philadelphia sports. The Eagles lost a playoff game a few days into the new year, and the only other Philadelphia team to make the playoffs was the Flyers — who lost in the first round. This fall’s Eagles started 9-3 and missed the playoffs, the Sixers gutted their roster intentionally in order to be bad and the Union missed a wide open net in the final minutes and lost in extra time of the U.S. Open Cup. And the Wings moved and became the New England Black Wolves! Ugh.

But it was a good year for sports GIFs. One was Twitter’s introduction of inline GIFs in tweets. Never before was it so easy (for me, at least) to share stupid little sports moments with the world instantly. It became so easy to share GIFs one of mine was retweeted an obscene amount of times.

This is my favorite NFL thing today so far. pic.twitter.com/xhQzMZJnGD

— Dan McQuade (@dhm) September 28, 2014

The Buccaneers’ Danny Lansanah preventing the Steelers Le’Veon Bell from making a first down gesture was undoubtedly the sports GIF of the year. But there’s no way to connect this to Philadelphia — Lansanah went to Harrisburg, which as close as I can get it — so it will have to remain outside the scope of this column.

Despite the bad year for Philadelphia sports, there was no shortage of great sports GIFs. If this sounds familiar, it’s pretty much the same spiel I did in 2012, when I last did this feature. It has not been a great few years for Philly sports. But the GIFs this year were, perhaps, better than ever. Presenting the best ones I made in 2014.

Honorable Mention

Here’s a woman yelling at the Phillie Phanatic in the stands.

And here’s the Phanatic harassing her as a result. Never mess with the Phillie Phanatic.

And here’s the Phanatic harassing a Philadelphia police officer.

Hey, there were sports highlights besides the Phillie Phanatic. Here’s Claude Giroux, setting up a player for the chokeslam.

Oddly enough, though, one of the best Flyers’ plays of the season came on the basketball court.

Here’s Chip Kelly, possibly eyeing a college job.

Mark Sanchez replaced the injured Nick Foles, and immediately threw a bomb to Jeremy Maclin for a 52-yard gain. Then, Lane Johnson clobbered him for some reason. Perhaps that is why Sanchez did not try another deep pass all season.

But Mark Sanchez did do a chipmunk impression.

Here is an accurate representation of Nick Foles’ season.

An accurate representation of the Phillies’ season.

Perhaps Cody Parkey didn’t hit those two field goals in the last Eagles game that mattered so that he wasn’t attacked by his teammates afterward.

Streamers at the Palestra!

Darren Sproles and LeSean McCoy did never get that celebration right, did they?

Here’s LeSean McCoy advertising dryer sheets.

Here’s Chris Polk scaring a Texans fan (accidentally).

Here’s Ryan Howard being attacked by his teammates after a game-winning hit.

The Eagles should have let this fan make the team’s first-round pick this year.

Ryan Howard may not hit as many homers as he used to, but he still hits them hard enough to make fans cower in fear. Dodgers fans, at least. Don’t hit the ball too hard when you’re out there, Jimmy.

The mockery of Braves pitcher Craig Kimbrel’s pitching routine was the best Philly fan moment of 2014.

The Top 10

Number 10. Hey, the Phanatic’s back! This was my favorite Phanatic skit of the year: On tax day, he and a guy playing an IRS agent did the twist to The Beatles’ “Taxman.” Then the Phanatic hit him with a pie.

Number 9. And, yeah, one more Phanatic GIF. This is from a Phillies TV ad. Jimmy Rollins, Larry Bowa and the Phanatic all do the move I like to call the “rally pelvis.”

Number 8. Mo’ne Davis was a phenom this summer, but nothing beat her teammate photobombing her during an ESPN interview.

Number 7. The Vinny Curry sack dance may go down as the greatest thing about the 2014 Eagles.

Number 6. The Phillies won so few games this year, Ben Revere danced to the plate.

Number 5. The Eagles may have lost to the Seahawks, but at least nobody flopped like Seattle’s Ricardo Lockette did.

Number 4. This is Jonathan Papelbon’s “adjustment.”

Number 3. In a play that echoed one from Jim McMahon 23 years ago, Jeremy Maclin crashed into a Gatorade table while playing the Cardinals. Coincidentally, the last Eagles team to go 10-6 and miss the playoffs was that year! This Eagles team has a chance to go 10-6 and miss the playoffs on Sunday.

Number 2. This showed up in the 11 best Jimmy Rollins GIFs, but Rollins cursing out a heckler after hitting a game-winning homer could have been the No. 1 Philly sports GIF. If not for…

Number 1. Chip Kelly doing the ice bucket challenge. “Diving into a pool of ice water” summed up being a Philadelphia sports fan in 2014. Everyone just ended up all wet.