Menu

1983 76ers

The Ma & Pa Trail: The 1983 Orioles & 76ers

, , , , ,

This is part of a series of sports history articles celebrating the best in 1983 sports. This piece asks the question of which geographic fan base had the best year in ’83.
A conventional choice for the top sports market of 1983 would be the great sports city of Philadelphia. The Philadelphia 76ers won the NBA championship thanks to Moses Malone and Julius Erving and the Phillies weren’t bad either, re-uniting three veterans of the old Big Red Machine (Joe Morgan, Tony Perez and Pete Rose) and won the National League pennant.

GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS
Start reading today. 


But let’s tweak that a little bit. The area where I used to live is a little bit north of Baltimore and an easy one-hour drive into Philadelphia. There’s a nearby hiking trail called Ma & Pa, for Maryland and Pennsylvania.  You could reasonably pull a favorite team from both cities and do so without violating any key rules of being a sports fan.
In the year of 1983, the Ma & Pa Trail was a dream spot to be for a sports fan. Your year saw an NBA title happen with the 76ers early on and close out with a World Series title from the Baltimore Orioles, with Eddie Murray and a young Cal Ripken leading the way.
Furthermore, both championship runs had redemptive qualities to them. The Sixers reached the NBA Finals in 1977, 1980 and 1982 and lost all three teams, to say nothing of a crushing loss to the Boston Celtics in the 1981 Eastern Conference Finals. The Orioles lost a heartbreaking World Series in 1979, saw a 100-win campaign come up short in 1980 and were eliminated on the final day of the 1982 regular season. 1983 saw both franchises finally get what they were looking for.
Neither the 76ers nor the Orioles have won it all since. But both franchises gave their fans a title run to remember in 1983 and there was no better place to be to enjoy it than the spot just off I-95 where I used to live, maybe a half-hour from Baltimore and an hour from Philly.
Read more about the 1983 Philadelphia 76ers
Read more about the 1983 Baltimore Orioles

logosnb

SportsNotebook Featured Products

View Our Complete Catalog

Shop our Catalog

The Sports Notebook Newsletter

TheSportsNotebook.com is home to an extensive archive of sports history articles along with blog posts on contemporary sports.

Shop Our Digital Catalog

History of the Final Four

NCAA Basketball

NCAA Basketball

Super Bowl Past

NFL

NFL

History of the Final Four

NCAA Basketball

NCAA Basketball

Super Bowl Past

NFL

NFL

History of the Final Four

NCAA Basketball

NCAA Basketball

Super Bowl Past

NFL

NFL

SportsNoteBook Articles

1977 Oklahoma Football: The National Title That Got Away

Barry Switzer’s Oklahoma Sooners were a program that was at least as good—if not better—than anyone in college football. Switzer inherited a team that was already operating at an elite level in 1973 and promptly went 10-1. He followed that up with back-to-back national titles in 1974 and 1975. In 1976, a couple of losses […]

1977 Texas Football: Greatness Ends With Heartbreak

Texas faced uncharacteristically low expectations when the 1977 season began. Legendary head coach Darrell Royal had retired, and the program was coming off a .500 season. They had not reached a major bowl game since 1973 and were clearly losing ground to archrival Oklahoma, who had won a pair of recent national titles. Fred Akers […]

1977 Arkansas Football: A Historic Orange Bowl Win

The 1977 Arkansas football season was the start of a new era in Razorback history. Frank Broyles retired after 19 program-defining seasons and moved upstairs to be the full-time athletic director and part-time ABC analyst, alongside Keith Jackson. Broyles’ replacement was Lou Holtz, a winner at N.C. State, and just off a less-than-successful fling with […]

1976 UCLA Football: The Donahue Era Begins

The 1976 UCLA football team was embarking on a new era. In 1975, after winning the Rose Bowl and finishing in the national top 5, head coach Dick Vermeil left for the NFL. The Bruins tapped Terry Donahue to take over. It began a 20-year tenure for Donahue in Westwood. In his first year, he […]

1976 Colorado Football: A Surprise Orange Bowl Trip

After finishing #3 in the country in 1971, Colorado had slipped back to mediocrity by the time head coach Bill Mallory came to Boulder in 1974. After another mediocre year, Mallory got the Buffaloes to 9-2 and a Bluebonnet Bowl invitation in 1975. The 1976 Colorado football team took advantage of a wide-open Big Eight […]

1976 Ohio State Football: The Beginning Of The End For Woody Hayes

Woody Hayes had taken Ohio State to four straight Rose Bowls from 1972-75. The 1976 Ohio State football team was still loaded and ranked #4 to start the season. They were certainly good, as evidenced by the fact they won a major bowl game. But some notable losses, including the one loss no Buckeye fan […]

1976 Maryland Football: A Major Bowl Season

Jerry Claiborne came to College Park in 1972, inheriting a program that hadn’t posted a winning season in ten years and gone 9-33 over the previous five seasons. Claiborne made immediate improvement, going 5-5-1. In 1973, the Terps went to a bowl game. In 1974 and 1975, they won consecutive ACC championships. The 1976 Maryland […]

1976 Houston Football: Crashing The SWC Party

The University of Houston’s football program had operated as an independent for much of its history. Prior to the 1976 season, the old Southwest Conference, led up by Texas and Arkansas, opened its doors and let Houston in. The Cougars were anything but timid new arrivals. The 1976 Houston football team not only won a […]