There was a time when reaching the postseason felt like a Sisyphussian task no band of mortals could ever achieve. After getting unceremoniously ousted from the 2011 playoffs following a franchise-best 102-win campaign, the Philadelphia Phillies meandered through a postseason-less wilderness for the next 11 years, the longest drought in the National League and the second-longest in baseball, until the 2022 Phils snuck into the playoffs as the third wild card team, at long last pushing their massive boulder to the top of the mountain.
Those Phillies then caught fire and took the city on a magical journey that ended just two wins short of a parade down Broad Street.