Congratulations Macy's!

Macy's ran an advertisement in the Philadelphia Inquirer Monday congratulating the Phillies on winning the 2009 World Series. The ad exclaims, "Congratulations Phillies! Back-to-Back Champs."

The Phillies, however, have done no such thing. At least not yet.

The erroneous ad (pictured above) covers a good portion of an entire page and may cause anger among superstitious Phillies fans who see the ad as a curse. CBS news presents the story here:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/02/sportsline/main5500110.shtml

The most embarrassing part is that the "congratulations" ad was run not in some middle-of-nowhere, baseball-illiterate town, but in the hometown of the Phillies. The Inquirer quickly issued an apology after noticing the hefty mistake. To no surprise, widespread mention and ridicule of the error managed to travel throughout cyberspace before the Philadelphia paper sorted things out. It remains a mystery how such an advertisement was able to breach the gatekeepers of the Inquirer and reach the public.

In review, we can conclude that one thing is certain: either Macy's has begun an ingenious campaign for a new product that can predict with certainty the outcome of sporting events, or the accuracy of the media is only steepening in its decline.

Ignoring my fun side, I'll go with the latter.