It’s late October. That means the temperature is dropping, the leaves are turning and you’ve been asked no less than 30 times what you’re going to be for Halloween.

It also means just one more series remains in Major League Baseball’s postseason.

And it’s the big one, the one that will determine the champion of the 2008 season.

The World Series kicks off tomorrow in Tampa Bay with the Rays playing host to the Philadelphia Phillies.

Now, 90 percent of the people reading this probably re-read that last sentence, and that’s because it didn’t say New York or Boston or Los Angeles. It said Tampa Bay and Philadelphia.

Of all the major sports, baseball relies most on the success of its traditional powers, like the Yankees and Red Sox.

As such, casual fans will probably find it very hard to take a significant interest in this year’s edition of the Fall Classic.

But just because the traditional names are absent, that doesn’t mean the storylines are too. In fact, this year’s World Series might have the most background storylines of any in recent memory simply because of these two teams’ histories.

Both the Rays and Phillies, historically-speaking, are probably two of the biggest losers in all of sports.

Both teams lose games like John Daly loses money when he sits down at the blackjack table.

In order to understand what a championship would mean to either of these franchises, and their respective cities, you first have to understand their histories.

For any Philadelphia sports franchise to be in the finals is a story in itself, considering no Philly sports team has won a championship since the 76ers of the NBA brought home a banner in 1983.

The Phillies’ lone World Series championship came three years prior in 1980.

At least they have one, the Rays would say.

This is the first postseason appearance for the Rays in their lowly 11-year existence.

In fact, this is the first time the Rays have turned in a winning season, and they ended up having the second-best record in the American League.

Talk about being darkest just before dawn. Tampa Bay has been blacked out for the past ten years.

In the 10 years prior to this season, the young club finished in dead last nine times.

They had never won more than 70 games in a season before this year, when they won 97.

Not to be outdone, of course, Philadelphia fans would tell you the Phillies have not only lost more games than any other team in Major League Baseball, but more games than any other sports franchise on this continent.

They surpassed 10,000 losses last year.

And it’s not just the Phillies. Rather than listing off the woes of the other Philly sports franchises, I’ll just tell you that several years ago, when ESPN compiled a list of the 15 most tortured sports cities, Philadelphia was ranked No. 2 behind only Cleveland.

They could write a book on how historically awful these two teams are.

But their pasts are what make their present situation so intriguing. So what if the Red Sox aren’t playing?

We should take this opportunity to watch these two teams on this stage because, quite frankly, it may be a while before they’re back.

Tampa Bay could disappear from the top just as quickly as it appeared from the cellar. And the Phillies, well, they always find ways to screw things up.

They’ve found more than 10,000 ways so far.

— Eric Dama is a journalism sophomore.