When the Hometown Teams Are Not Faring Well. . .

Focus on the big events in your town.

Memorial Day weekend in Philadelphia brings the national lacrosse championships.  Philadelphia has become a much bigger lacrosse town than a few generations ago, when the Baltimore area, Long Island and New York's Central Valley dominated the lacrosse landscape.  The sport has grown, Philadelphia high school teams have gotten a lot better and routinely send kids to all major programs.  The event at Lincoln Financial Field promises to be a good one.

As if that weren't enough, an even rarer gem will surface at a more infrequent interval -- 35 years -- golf's U.S. Open.  It will return to Merion, the legendary course, on the week leading up to Father's Day.  That also promises to be a special event.

So, yes, the Phillies are aging, the Eagles are rebuilding and the 76ers and Flyers are non-entities, but at least there are some special events that will keep our interest, at least for a while.

Put differently, assuming that the Phillies will not be a contender, those events will keep people buzzing -- or should -- until July trade deadline talk and Eagles pre-season talk start to dominate water-cooler conversations.

Then again, astute observers, those who will put this analysis under a microscope, probably will disagree with me and they have a point.  The average Phillies and Eagles fan probably doesn't care much about college lacrosse and probably doesn't care a whole lot about the U.S. Open, either, so for them the countdown until either trade talk about the Phillies or the Eagles' start of training camp must be torture.  Five years ago, the conversations were much different.  Today, well, times for the fan of the local professional sports teams are pretty bleak.

But the lacrosse Final Fours will be an event, and the game is fast-paced, so. . .