As our regular readers know, we arguably do way more content about Chicago pro sports teams than most ostensibly broader sites do. We happen to have a couple of very passionate diehard fans who LOVE the Cubs in our midst. And if you’re a Chicago sports fan these days, you really need a lifeline. Especially when you realize how G-d-awful that other baseball team has become.
As CBS Sports’ Mike Axisa reported last night:
For the second time this season, the Chicago White Sox have set a new record for the longest single-season losing streak in franchise history. Monday night Chicago gave up six eighth-inning runs against the Kansas City Royals to blow a 5-2 lead (KC 8, CWS 5), sending the White Sox to their 15th consecutive loss. They are 27-82 on the season. That is a 122-loss pace.
Should that pace continue, that would be more losses than any team in modern major league history. More than the American League’s all-time losingest team, the 2003 Detroit Tigers. More than even the legendary first-ever New York Mets team of 1962. And unlike the Tigers, who managed to get in all 162 games as compared to the Mets’ 160 to assure themselves of a slightly higher winning percentage (.265) than the Mets (.250), with last night’s loss the White Sox’ percentage of .248 is now even below the Mets’.
Last night’s meltdown produced a whole new set of negative stats, again per Axisa:
Their losing streak is up to 15 games. Earlier this season they set the franchise single-season record with 14 consecutive losses, and now that record has been broken. Here are the longest losing streaks in White Sox history:
- 15 games: July 10, 2024 to present
- 14 games: May 22 to June 6, 2024
- 13 games: Aug. 9-26, 1924
Yep, we’re talking about something that occurs once in a century now occuring twice in the last four months. And counting.
And it’s also creating some inglorious comparisons with recent history as well:
Chicago’s 15-game losing streak is the longest by any team since the Baltimore Orioles lost 19 straight games from Aug. 3-24, 2021.
The team is way worse than merely dead last in the division and league. We’re talking 32 games out of the THIRD WILD CARD. 38 1/2 games behind the Central and league-leading Guardians. The tragic number to eliminate them from pennant contention is 17–and there’s still two days left in JULY. Their run differential of -221 is MORE THAN TWICE the number as the league’s second-worst team.
And with the trade deadline looming by this day’s end, as Axisa concludes, even more daunting times could be forthcoming:
(E)arlier in the day Monday, Chicago traded Erick Fedde and Tommy Pham to the St. Louis Cardinals and Michael Kopech to the Los Angeles Dodgers in a three-team trade. All-Star Garrett Crochet could move before the deadline. It’s possible the White Sox will field an even worse team in August and September. Yikes.
If you take a closer look at these losers’ ensuing years, signs indicate there could be far better days not all that far off. Two years after that epic losing stream, the Orioles won 101 games and are currently on top of the AL East. The Tigers were American League champions three years after that 119-loss effort. The Mets won it all six years later.
But if you watched last night as I did, hoping against hope this story might have a positive spin, only to see Bobby Witt, Jr.’s grand slam secure their fate and their new loss record, you would see a team devoid of talent, direction and strategy. Hopeless? Maybe not completely. But listless and lifeless? Hell yah.
The Cubs are in last place in their division as well, but at least still on the fringe of the wild card race and, as my colleague alluded to Sunday, seem to be on the buying side of the ledger. The Bears and Caleb Williams are in training camp. The Sky–yes, they exist in the market, too–are competitive.
So there are reasons for Chicago sports lovers to wake up in the morning. Just far fewer on the Southside.
Courage…