erik lundegaard

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Tuesday October 27, 2015

2015 World Series: At Least One Title Drought Ends in the Battle of the Expansion Teams

Game 1 of the 2015 World Series is tonight and I'll be rooting for the Kansas City Royals; but if either team wins it'll end a title drought of at least 29 years. We haven't seen that kind of matchup since 2010, when the Giants (last title: 1954) played the Rangers (last title: nevah). 

For the curious, here's the list, sorted by years since a team's last World Series title. For the eight teams without titles, I went with the year they were founded:

Series Apps Team Most Recent Title Most Recent Appearance Year Founded Years Since Title
10 Chicago Cubs 1908 1945 1874 107
5 Cleveland Indians 1948 1997 1901 67
2 Texas Rangers n/a 2011 1961 54
1 Houston Astros n/a 2005 1962 53
1 Milwaukee Brewers n/a 1982 1969 46
2 San Diego Padres n/a 1998 1969 46
0 Washington Nationals n/a n/a 1969 46
0 Seattle Mariners n/a n/a 1977 38
7 Pittsburgh Pirates 1979 1979 1882 36
7 Baltimore Orioles 1983 1983 1900 32
11 Detroit Tigers 1984 2012 1901 31
4 Kansas City Royals 1985 2014 1969 30
5 New York Mets 1986 2015 1962 29
18 Los Angeles Dodgers 1988 1988 1884 27
14 Oakland Athletics 1989 1990 1901 26
9 Cincinnati Reds 1990 1990 1882 25
6 Minnesota Twins 1991 1991 1901 24
1 Colorado Rockies n/a 2007 1993 22
2 Toronto Blue Jays 1993 1993 1977 22
9 Atlanta Braves 1995 1999 1871 20
1 Tampa Bay Rays n/a 2008 1998 17
1 Arizona Diamondbacks 2001 2001 1998 14
1 Los Angeles Angels 2002 2002 1961 13
2 Miami Marlins 2003 2003 1993 12
5 Chicago White Sox 2005 2005 1901 10
7 Philadelphia Phillies 2008 2009 1883 7
40 New York Yankees 2009 2009 1903 6
19 St. Louis Cardinals 2011 2013 1882 4
12 Boston Red Sox  2013 2013 1901 2
20 San Francisco Giants 2014 2014 1883 1

Some interesting numbers. The Cubs, despite not having dipped a toe in the World Series since 1945, have still been to 10 of them, which is more than all but seven other teams. 

This year's Series is also the first between two expansion teams. That surprised me. It also surprised me that none of the expansion teams have done well historically. In fact, these two, the Royals and the Mets, are the most successful of the newcomers. The Mets, founded in 1961, have been in the same number of World Series (5) as the White Sox and Indians, founded in 1901. They've won as many titles (2) as the Indians and Phillies and Cubs. If the Royals win this year, they'll join them. If the Mets win this year, they'll share the same number of titles (3) as the Braves, Twins and Orioles.

I guess this is what surprised me most: World Series titles are tough to come by unless you're the Yankees. Only eight teams have five or more titles in their history and only two teams have 10 or more: that would be the St. Louis Cardinals, with 11, and the New York Yankees Suck with ... 27. The Yankees have the same number of titles as the bottom 21 teams combined. And people wonder why I call them the 1% of baseball. 

But at least the Yanks won't be adding to that number this year. Here's hoping for a good Series with a Royals victory. Here's hoping for Cubs/Indians sometime in the future. 

Lorenzo Cain scores from first base on a single by Eric Hosmer for the go-ahead run in the 2015 ALCS

Don't try this at home: Lorenzo Cain went from first to home on a single for the go-ahead run in the bottom of the 8th inning of Game 6 of the 2015 ALCS.

Posted at 06:32 AM on Tuesday October 27, 2015 in category Baseball