We have never seen anything like it before

September 24, 2024 12:55 PM

It’s natural to focus on successful teams: Winning is, after all, the point of every game, the reason we have scoreboards in the first place. But we remember the truly great teams far more than we remember the regular everyday champions: to be the best at something will make you immortal. It thus stands to reason that being the best at losing is also eternal. from The Beauty of the White Sox’s Historically Abysmal Season [Intelligencer; ungated]

How White Sox clubhouse is coping as worst team in MLB history [ESPN]
White Sox approaching MLB record for losses draws sympathy from surviving 1962 Mets [Yahoo Sports]
How Does a Baseball Team Lose 120 Games? Every Way You Can Think Of. [NY Times; ungated]
MLB Reminds White Sox That Games Televised [The Onion]

Six games to go, first Angels, then Tigers

posted by chavenet (29 comments total)

Do you know who won the World Series in 1962?

No. And that's why I keep getting outed as a foreign spy.

Do you even care?

Not enough to not be constantly outed as a foreign spy.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 1:03 PM on September 24 [8 favorites]

Somebody activate the Bois Signal.
posted by mhoye at 1:03 PM on September 24 [6 favorites]

They will end up breaking the record to a similar degree that Bob Beamon broke the long-jump record. I will never be able to get excited again when a team comes out of the gate 2-20...
posted by AJaffe at 1:09 PM on September 24 [2 favorites]

I am a Blue Jays fan and have been watching this from a distance with a kind of horrified fascination. Many Jays fans are calling for mass firings and possibly even a total teardown because the Jays are 73-84 as I type this - the Sox are 36 1/2 games worse than that.

I grew up reading about the 1962 Mets and couldn't possibly imagine that a team could be worse. This year's White Sox boggle my mind. I feel so sorry for their fans.

I must admit, though, that I hope that they become the worst modern-era team ever - who doesn't want to watch history? I'm proud of the fact that I was actually at the ballgame where the last 20-game losing pitcher reached this mark (Mike Maroth in 2003 - specifically, September 3).
posted by tallmiddleagedgeek at 1:09 PM on September 24 [3 favorites]

I've been grinding my teeth watching my Sox (the Red ones) stumble and bumble through the season in annoyance and the fans aren't happy and John Henry is looking to save even more money. I've watched the A's do far better than they should have in this last gasp before the owners cement their legacy to the sound of a wet fart along the banks of the Sacramento River.

For the fans of the White Sox, they had to embrace the awfulness - what else is there to do and still be a fan?
posted by drewbage1847 at 1:16 PM on September 24 [4 favorites]

If you're gonna have an extremely sucky season, you might as well have the worst season of all time.
posted by kirkaracha at 1:21 PM on September 24 [8 favorites]

Still, you've got to hand it to the White Sox. If you throw it, they'll drop it.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 1:30 PM on September 24 [24 favorites]

The good news is if the trend line continues, they shouldn't dip into negative games won until 2026.
posted by maxwelton at 1:32 PM on September 24 [5 favorites]

Still, you've got to hand it to the White Sox. If you throw it, they'll drop it.

cue dril
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 2:59 PM on September 24 [2 favorites]

no baseball team has ever been more like a dril tweet tbh
posted by We put our faith in Blast Hardcheese at 3:00 PM on September 24 [3 favorites]

Do you know who won the World Series in 1962?

Hey, that’s not that obscure a World Series!

On the occasion of his Hall of Fame election 26 years later, McCovey was asked how he would like his career to be remembered. “As the guy who hit the ball over Bobby Richardson’s head in the seventh game,” replied McCovey
posted by atoxyl at 3:12 PM on September 24 [3 favorites]

(the joke is: he did not)
posted by atoxyl at 3:13 PM on September 24 [3 favorites]

I wonder if we will find this dovetails into the thread about the rise of sports betting.
posted by jellywerker at 5:01 PM on September 24 [1 favorite]

I’m Australian and have never followed baseball to speak of but I have a lot of family in Chicago and watching their increasingly dumbfounded reactions to the White Sox has been very funny. I feel extremely privileged that when I saw the Sox play the Cardinals at the charmingly titled Guaranteed Rate Field last year the Sox actually won.
posted by the duck by the oboe at 7:27 PM on September 24 [1 favorite]

Growing up I used to follow the Tigers and the Brewers. The Tigers were closer to home, so I was able to watch them more, but after their 119-loss 2003 season, I gave up. They were terrible in the few seasons prior to 2003, but that particular season killed any enjoyment I had, and I just converted to a full-time Brewers fan. It's been a good ride last couple of years. I hope the Sox fans losing their will can find something for them elsewhere.
posted by Metro Gnome at 9:36 PM on September 24 [1 favorite]

Of course they beat the Angels last night...
posted by chavenet at 11:44 PM on September 24

At a party in October 2003, I was having a rambling conversation with a few guys and the topic turned to baseball. One lamented the Orioles having another poor season, while another said how his beloved Yankees should have won the Series.

"How about you?" one guy asked. "Who's your team?"

I said the truth: "The Detroit Tigers." Who, at the time, had set the AL record for losses with 119. It was their tenth consecutive losing season.

The guy reached out. "Sir, I want to shake your hand."

In a similar spirit, I metaphorically shake the hands of all White Sox fans. Baseball fandom is ridiculous and great. Appreciate how few fans will ever know the weirdness of your situation. And dammit, you have my respect. Welcome to history.
posted by Harvey Jerkwater at 6:56 AM on September 25 [6 favorites]

one of my favorite things about baseball is just how much failure is bulit into the sport. I mean, Ted Williams is a damn legend for hitting more than 40% of the time. He was the last and that was 83 years ago!
posted by drewbage1847 at 9:16 AM on September 25 [3 favorites]

As a lifelong Orioles fan, I resonate deeply with this article. Despite the fact that the O's have won the world series twice in my lifetime (although both of which were when I was under the age of 10), the most memorable season was 1988, where the O's lost the first 21 games of the season. Local DJ Bob Rivers, in the middle of that streak, promised to stay on the air until the Orioles won a game. He was ultimately on the air for 11 days, 258 straight hours.
posted by Ben Trismegistus at 11:05 AM on September 25 [1 favorite]

This reminds me of the worst meal experience I ever had, in which the restaurant was clearly VERY short staffed, out of silverware, no time to clean up the giant food spill right in the flow of traffic, out of food or it's the wrong temperature, etc., etc. I cheered up my friends (people into storytelling) by being all, "This is a bad story! Write down everything bad that happens! This is a trainwreck and all you can do is enjoy it!" Sometimes you gotta roll with the avalanche from hell, since you can't stop it.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:31 AM on September 25 [1 favorite]

Oh, I forgot why I was in here: WaPo: How to cover the worst MLB team ever without going (too) insane
In a historically lousy season, the White Sox press corps is just trying to survive, and have a few laughs in the process.

“A month into the year, it’s, ‘Why do you suck?’ And the answer has always been: ‘Well, we don’t want to suck. We’re trying hard not to suck.’ And they’ve answered it over and over and over again,” said Bruce Levine, a veteran baseball reporter in town.

“It’s a bummer to talk to a bunch of players and coaches where nothing’s going well because for a story you usually want plot construction,” said James Fegan, who covers the team for the insightful website Sox Machine. “A problem, a proposed solution and then you can say there’s progress being seen. That progress part isn’t happening here.”

He added: “It’s like the only thing to write about this team is just how awful this thing is, which is also the only thing that everybody’s exhausted talking about.”
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:42 AM on September 25 [1 favorite]

The Tigers were closer to home, so I was able to watch them more, but after their 119-loss 2003 season, I gave up.

That's the season I was thinking of! They were so close to greatness (in sucking)!
posted by kirkaracha at 12:15 PM on September 25 [1 favorite]

one of my favorite things about baseball is just how much failure is bulit into the sport. I mean, Ted Williams is a damn legend for hitting more than 40% of the time. He was the last and that was 83 years ago!

With the Negro Leagues being added to official stats, five more instances of batting .400 or over took place during the 1940s.
Josh Gibson averaged over .400 when combining '43 and '44. (501 plate appearances)
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 12:43 PM on September 25 [2 favorites]

Good point - weirdly when I went and double checked myself Gibson wasn't listed!
posted by drewbage1847 at 1:09 PM on September 25 [1 favorite]

Do you know who won the World Series in 1962?

Hey, that’s not that obscure a World Series!

It had one of the greatest Game 7s ever, memorable to enough to be commemorated in Peanuts. Twice.
posted by non canadian guy at 4:05 PM on September 25 [2 favorites]

I have been going to Detroit to watch baseball with a good friend the last weekend the Tigers are at home every season for the last 26 years, missing in 2020 and 2023 (COVID and a nasty fall at home where I badly damaged my foot and nearly snapped my right big toe clean off).

I was there on a rainy Saturday night in 2003 when the Tigers were at 119 losses and losing badly to the Twins. My buddy is a Tigers’ fan and I was cackling at him that we would get to see history. The Tigers rallied to come back and then won the next game to avoid losing the 120th.

I am going to be at the game on Sunday and I am somewhat sad that they will have already set the record by then. Maybe the Tigers will clinch a wild card spot that afternoon!

I am a huge baseball fan — I watch at least 100 Jays + others games via streaming platforms. Bad teams lose all sorts of games and from my perspective there is nothing special about this terrible White Sox team. Knowledgable fans could’ve told you this was coming. Not this bad but to be terrible for the next several years.

The real issue is that the team is owned by a billionaire who is trying to run it like it’s 1980’s. Their owner is the driving force behind the last two baseball stoppages and currently crying poor and attempting to shake down taxpayers for a new stadium.
posted by grmpyprogrammer at 5:19 PM on September 25 [1 favorite]

With a win today, the Chisox would at least be guaranteed to avoid matching the .235 winning percentage of the 1916 Philadelphia A’s, which is the nadir in the modern era.
posted by non canadian guy at 12:20 PM on September 26 [1 favorite]

Welp, they did it. Loss #121.

And speaking of improbable happenings on a baseball diamond, how 'bout those Motor City Kitties who did it to 'em?
posted by non canadian guy at 6:55 PM on September 27 [2 favorites]

I'd like to thank the Mariners for throwing away a 10-game lead on the division in essentially three weeks mid-season to once again end up missing the playoffs by at most one game and maybe even a statistical tie for the last wildcard spot if they win today and KC loses. (KC won the season series against us, so we were mathematically eliminated days ago.) The M's are maybe one of the best teams at building hope and then dashing it. ( A quick solution to our woes is to allow the M's to play all their games at home, where they win 60% of the time.)

The White Sox have allowed over 300 more runs than they've scored, which is never going to get you far. The yanks and dodgers (top AL and NL) both scored about 150 more runs than their opponents.
posted by maxwelton at 2:42 PM on September 29