Philadelphia’s Biggest Losers of 2015
Listen. Philadelphia is a great city. We love and adore it. But it’s not all hammocks on the waterfront, Indego and Bobby Hill. We must take the good with the bad, and — continuing our annual tradition — the latter is what we bring you here. Philadelphia’s biggest losers of 2015. Add your own losers in the comments below.
Montco dad Mike Rossi crosses the Boston Marathon finish line.
Boston Marathon Runner Mike Rossi
We’re pretty sure that you’ve lost the public relations race once Cecily Tynan steps into to the fray.
Nordstrom Rack
Center City shopping fans anxiously awaited this replacement of Daffy’s in the same way that Star Wars fans anxiously awaited the release of the Star Wars prequels, and the store has turned out to be as big a disappointment as The Phantom Menace.
Philly Sports Except Temple Football
The word “epic” is easily the most overused word of 2015, but no other descriptor can accurately capture the level of failure that our athletes and sports franchises have achieved. The only good news is that 2016 couldn’t possibly be any worse. Right? Right??
Temple Football
Selling the right to sing the National Anthem at games? We cannot abide with that.
Papal Naysayers
Philadelphia loves to complain, but the complainers among us brought it to a whole new level with what turned out to be an incredible moment for our city.
Photo | Bradley Maule
Papal Taxpayers
LetsRun.com offered Mike Rossi $100,000 if he could match his controversial time in the race that qualified him to run the Boston Marathon. We should have offered Mayor Nutter $100,000 if the city’s assurances held true that the World Meeting of Families would pick up the tab for the pope. Your bill, taxpaying residents of Philadelphia: $8 million.
Yangming
Pro-tip: When your restaurant has an active roach infestation and a customer complains after their kid gets two dishes containing roaches, DON’T CALL THE COPS ON THEM.
Kathryn Knott walks from the criminal justice center Thursday, Dec. 17, 2015, in Philadelphia.
Kathryn Knott
At her February 8th sentencing, we sincerely hope that we can all say buh-bye to Ms. Knott for a couple of years.
Philly Jesus
If this guy gets into heaven, we’re tearing up our application.
Photo | Jeff Fusco
SEPTA
The transit agency would have made it onto the list thanks to the still not-existing SEPTA Key alone, but then they somehow managed to release new paper schedules last week that were riddled with errors, thereby defeating the very purpose of said schedules.
Michael Villalpando at Jose Pistola’s (left) and in his most recent mugshot photo (right).
Dine-and-Dashers
Whatever you do, don’t let him or her into your restaurant.
Lawyer Dean Weitzman in a My Philly Lawyer TV commercial
My Philly Lawyer
Less than 24 hours after May’s deadly Amtrak crash and with some passengers still unaccounted for, Philadelphia attorney Dean Weitzman — you’ve seen him on those My Philly Lawyer commercials on TV — shamelessly sent out a press release offering his services to victims.
Le Bec Fin 2.0 | Mike Persico
1523 Walnut Street
What was once Philadelphia’s most important culinary destination will soon be the world’s largest Sunglasses Hut.
The view from Le Bok Fin. | Photo by Michelle Gustafson
Le Bok Fin Whiners
How dare someone open a rooftop bar with stellar views on the roof of an unused building in South Philly.
Bruce Castor
Had he not chickened out of filing criminal charges against Bill Cosby way back in 2005, he would be getting sworn in as District Attorney of Montgomery County in January.
Those Lights On North Broad
Apparently the city didn’t learn a thing from its sad 1999 attempt at lighting design.
Elected Officials in Harrisburg
Budget? What budget?
Northeast Philly Commuters
Somehow, I-95 from 676 up to Cottman Avenue has become the new Conshohocken Curve.
The binder of Porngate emails, available at the Supreme Court Office of Prothonotary at City Hall. | Joel Mathis
Everything and Everyone Involved in “Porngate”
We’ll be very happy when we never have to use that word again.
Local Journalism
First the City Paper. Then massive layoffs at Philly.com, the Daily News and the Inquirer. Seriously, people, go buy a frigging paper. We don’t have many chances to make an allusion to the 1980s Philly hair metal band Cinderella, but this is exactly what they were talking about.
Bill Cosby
Like the flu, we just can’t get rid of him. (UPDATE: We may be getting closer to getting rid of him, it turns out. Hours after this article was published, Cosby was charged with assaulting a young woman.)
Chaka Fattah (left) and Chip Fattah. Photos | Matt Rourke, AP
The Fattahs
One convicted, one indicted. But it could be a great reality show.
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