The week’s questions and discussion…
1) By almost all sports media accounts the 2024 Chicago White Sox are a bad team. As of April l5 their record was 2-12 giving the team its worst 15-game start in franchise history. Presently the Sox current winning percentage of .158 (through April 19) puts them on target for a 136-loss season which in all likelihood isn’t going to occur.
However just how bad are they? Are the White Sox 1962 New York Mets bad… the team that holds the modern day MLB record for futility in a single season with 120 losses? Why or why not?
As of Thursday morning (4/25) the White Sox’ record stood at 3 wins and 22 losses making the Sox only the fourth team in baseball history to lose 22 of their first 25 games. The other three teams all finished their seasons with at least 100 losses with one team… the 2003 Detroit Tigers… winding up with 119 losses.
Now understand that the White Sox, who went 61-101 last season, have traded their best pitch in Dylan Cease and two of their better players… Luis Robert and Yoan Moncada are injured and maybe their best player only recently began playing games on a regular basis after he only recently just returned from an injury. The point being this is a team that was not very good from the get go and losing their best starter along with having some of their better players hurt or recovering from being hurt this a bad team that might become even worse. Frankly, this could be one of the worst seasons that a MLB team has ever had.
All of which is to say equaling, or even surpassing, the 1962 Mets’ record of 40-120 is very much in play for this Chicago White Sox team.
2) However as bad as the White Sox record presently is, they aren’t alone in their standard of losing for this season.
As of the morning of April 20 the Miami Marlins record was 4-16 (.200) and the Colorado Rockies were at 4-15 (.211).
Will the 2024 season see at least three teams lose at least 100 games or maybe even 110 games? Why or why not?
And which team in your estimation will “win” the title for being the worst team of the 2024 season Why?
Let me cut to the end first…
Without a doubt the White Sox will be the worst team this season.
As for the Marlins and the Rockies…
As of Thursday AM the Marlins record was 6-20 for a .231 percentage putting them on pace to win just 37 games.
The Rockies record as of Thursday stood at 7-19 for .269 percentage putting them on pace to win just 43 games.
Meaning that not only are there three teams with a better than decent chance to lose at least 100 games this season but there are three teams all with a shot at equaling the ’62 Mets record for losing in a season, also.
3) After the first 21 games of the season the Houston Astros record is 7-14 and the team’s ERA stood at 5.13 ERA, the second worst in baseball and better than only the Rockies (6.01 ERA).
If the Astros don’t find a fix to their pitching woes are they in serious danger of not making the playoffs this season? Why or why not?
Simply put, injuries to the rotation, underperformance from the bullpen and bad luck on offense have sunk the Astros to last in the AL West.
On offense the Astros are averaging 2.4 runs per game and have posted a .592 OPS as a team. They’ve hit only two homers in the past six games and are batting .200 with runners in scoring position in that span. That will change they have just to man y good hitters not to get better on offense.
Now addressing the pitching they will eventually begin to get healthier. In fact Justin Verlander is already back in their rotation and in his two is 1-0 with a 1.74 ERA and 1.06 WHIP.
And among the other starters… Framber Valdez (elbow inflammation), Cristian Javier (neck discomfort), Lance McCullers Jr. (elbow surgery), Jose Urquidy (Tommy John surgery) and Luis Garcia (strained forearm)… three of the wounded warriors… Valdez, Urquidy and Javiers are expected back in the next week or so and will add some welcomed depth and improvement to their rotation.
And Garcia and McCullers should be returning from their surgeries around the All-Star break.
Now while setbacks could happen with any of these pitchers and who knows how they will respond from not being o the mound for however long they have been on the IL, with so many starters becoming available they can hopefully pick and choose from the best of the lot… assuming that they all don’t just stink and that some of them will be maybe not as good as Verlander has been so far but will be at least serviceable in the rotation.
Now considering that they are sitting at 7-19 (as of 4/25) and last in the West they are still only 6.5 games out of first and 7.5 games from the last Wild Card spot… I’m not sure if they can hold the fort until they get healthy with their rotation but if they can then this team should be able to just squeak into a wild card slot.
4) And speaking of teams that are more or less under-performing from the predicted expectations for the season, as of Saturday morning (4/20) the Dodgers record was 12-10.
In your opinion what is the main reason for their “slow” start out of the gate so far this season?
And will it be a problem for the team throughout the remainder of the season? Why or why not?
Underperforming starting pitching.
Their pitchers who have at least three starts only Tyler Glasnow (2.92) and James Paxton (2.61) have ERAs under 3.00. And of the others just Yoshinobu Yamamoto (3.50) has an ERA under 4.00. Bobby Miller and Gavin Stone are at 5.40 and 6.00 respectively.
Meaning that in almost half their games the Dodgers need to outhit and outscore teams to win games more often than not.
Luckily they have a lineup that can do that in most of their games.
And just when it began looking like the Dodgers were going to continue underperforming ways by losing two of three to both the Mets and the Nationals they have just as quickly won their last four games in a row.
This is a team that no matter how poor their pitching might be at times has just too many premium hitters in their lineup and will outscore most teams if it comes down to a slug fest. And frankly I believe the Dodgers will just batter most team’s starters from jump street all season long and maybe they won’t wind up with the best win/loss record overall, but I’ll bet dollars to doughnuts they wind up winning an easy 100 games based just on their offense.
5) As the season hits the 20+ game mark of the season for MLB, which team in your opinion has been the biggest surprise of the year so far? Why?
The two biggest surprises to me are…
That the Guardians are sitting at the top of the AL Central with a sparkling 18-7 (.720) record…
And…
That the Athletics aren’t the worst team in the majors and in fact are sporting… for them… a decent record of 10-16 (.385).
Extra Innings…
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