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Reuters

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Reuters

Michael Phelps is arguably one of the greatest Olympians of all time. The 23x gold medallist swimmer, however, is fast becoming popular in the baseball world as well. Once a Baltimore Orioles fan, Phelps famously showed his changed allegiance when he came to deliver the first pitch in NLCS game 5 at Chase Field. Now his friend is doing the same rituals in the 2023 World Series. Does these two co-relate beyond our imagination?

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Diamondbacks invited Phelps’ close friend and golfer Jon Rahm to throw the first pitch in game 4 of the World Series Tuesday night. This makes one wonder whether the changed allegiance of the “Baltimore Bullet” had a particular reason.

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Phelps and Rahm’s close friendship and Rahm’s World Series pitch

Michael Phelps, after retiring from swimming, started talking about mental health issues. Thus, he began to help athletes and players who were dealing with them. Jon Rahm was one of those players. The American swimmer helped him to the extent that Rahm credited him after becoming PDGA world no.1.

When you’re the greatest Olympian of all time, you definitely have a couple tricks up your sleeve, a couple good moments of wisdom in that sense.. I’m not going to disclose too much on what I’ve asked him golf-wise, but he has helped me a lot.” said Rahm after becoming world no.1.

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It is known Jon Rahm lives in Phoenix and is a big supporter of the Diamondbacks. So can it happen that because of this close friendship, Rahm convinced Phelps to support the Diamondbacks?

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Michael Phelps after all is called the “Baltimore Bullet” and is said to be a fierce supporter of the Baltimore Orioles. Although the fans never doubted his support for the team this year gave them a strange feeling. “The Birds” actually went flying this year with a record of 101-61 in the regular season. This was the first time since 1980 that they had won more than 100 games in a season. The team qualified for the postseason for the first time since 2016.

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No fan wanted to miss the team in the stadium. But conspicuously there was one super fan who was missing the entire season. It was Michael Phelps. How come he never visited the team while they were winning like this? Now that he’s been to the Chase Field multiple times it gives credence to the question. Has he actually changed allegiances because of his friend Rahm?

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Phelps has been to Chase Field before

Surprisingly for the fans, NCLS was not the first Phelps has thrown a pitch in a D-Backs game. He did so in 2017 as well. That time he threw the first pitch in a game between the Snakes and LA Dodgers. Phelps has also thrown a pitch for the “O’s” but he did it way back in 2003.

The Orioles fans had ignored his D-Backs’ pitch then but this time they are asking questions. So is it a moment of changed allegiances or just a friend supporting another friend’s team as a mark of their relationship? Whatever it is, it has given a tremendous talking point to baseball fans worldwide.

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Sanskar.dubey

1,270 Articles

Sanskar Dubey is an MLB and Olympics writer at EssentiallySports. From writing various aspects of baseball like MLB Rule Modifications to diving deep into the world of various avenues of Olympics like swimming and gymnastics, Sanskar covers it all. He loves to write for the sport when there is a hot tussle between the National League and American League throughout the season. He believes the most iconic moment in MLB history was when Shohei Ohtani made his debut with the Los Angeles Angels and then when Showtime inked a jaw-dropping $700 million deal with the Dodgers. Beyond his dedication to baseball, Sanskar also has a fondness for watching soccer matches, indulging in movie marathons, and immersing himself in various artistic pursuits during his leisure time.

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Deepanshi Bajaj

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