Every season starts with promise for all teams, and when it is over one stands as the champion, but sometimes there is an air of improbablilty to the accomplishment.

In no way does that imply that the champion is unworthy, just that the path taken to a title is different for every team, and sometimes the destination is reached in the strangest of ways.

Few paths ever have seemed as improbable as the one being traveled by the Colorado Rockies, who began a mid-September run that has seen them win 21 of 22 games in a streak that includes a playoff game against the San Diego Padres and postseason sweeps of the Philadelphia Phillies and Arizona Diamondbacks, the latter giving the franchise its first ever National League pennant.

The best and most recent comparison in Denver sports history is the Denver Broncos’ 1977 trip to Super Bowl XII.