So You Didn’t Win The World Series
A look at how the teams that came *this* close to glory fared the following seasons.
If you’re like me, you were pulling hard for the Cleveland Indians to shock the world and upset the 103-win Chicago Cubs. They were an ideal bandwagon team; an exciting ace, shutdown relievers, and electric young talent. They had been able to advance despite major injuries and were labeled as big underdogs facing a stacked opponent. After going up three games to one, it seemed like they just might pull it off. Alas, it wasn’t to be, and instead it’s the long-suffering fans on the north side of Chicago celebrating the end of a long drought.
Knowing my penchant for underdog-rooting, my wife seemed surprised when I told her I wasn’t cheering for the team that hadn’t won a World Series in 108 years. While I was probably unsuccessful in explaining the idea of “windows of contention”, the difference in payroll (the Cubs have $71.69 million more on the books than the Indians, according to spotrac.com) was enough to show her that they weren’t exactly a bunch of no-namers. What it really boiled down to was, even if the Cubs lost, they would probably still be the World Series favorites heading into next year; while the Indians, in my far-from-expert-opinion, would be favored less.
In 1998, I was a high school freshman who had waited my entire life (sarcasm included) to see the Padres in the World Series (I recall surprisingly little of the ’84 Fall Classic, as I was but two months and three days old for the first pitch of Game 1). After getting swept in four games by the Yankees, I wasn’t just disappointed, I was furious. We had been so close, and now what? The next year, Greg Vaughn was traded, and Steve Finley, Ken Caminiti, and Kevin Brown all left to free agency. The 1999 Padres finished 14 games below .500, and I suddenly became more interested in girls and loud music.
But does it always have to be this way? Surely there are teams that lose the World Series and still have high hopes. To the chart!
Dating back to the beginning of MLB’s Wild Card format, in the past 21 years, only one team has lost the World Series and returned to win it the following season (2015 Kansas City Royals). Six of the World Series losers (28.5 percent) failed to make the playoffs the following year. Just one other team (2006 St. Louis Cardinals) won it within three years of a World Series loss. By the third year after a World Series loss, a whopping 68.4 percent of teams fail to make the playoffs.
How much any of this correlates is certainly up for debate. We could also look at their playoff performances leading up to their World Series loss, or compare them with the three seasons following a World Series win. The ebb and flow of contending seasons all teams experience certainly make it difficult to compare every World Series runner-up.
Adding this year’s Cubs team to the equation, there have been twelve different teams that have won the World Series in the past 22 years. Of those twelve, five had also lost a World Series during the sample. That leaves 18 teams who haven’t won a championship since the last player strike (1994), if ever. Of those 18 teams, eight came close, but were unable to seal the deal in the final series of the season.
Will the Indians defy odds again and terrorize the American League with a healthy Danny Salazar, Carlos Carrasco, and Michael Brantley? Will they put to rest the Crying Jordan and 3–1 memes that will most certainly haunt them well into next season? They most certainly could. But if the history of World Series losers is any indication, it will definitely be an uphill battle to claim the trophy they narrowly missed out on last night.
