October 19, 2005

Every series has gone the opposite of what I wanted, so the white sox don't have a chance. In fact, I fully expect clemens to pitch and win games 1,4 and 7. Probably a no hitter with 20 ks in the clencher.

posted by justgary at 12:04 AM on October 20, 2005

Should have some terrific pitching and some fun strategy calls to argue over endlessly.

posted by yerfatma at 06:05 AM on October 20, 2005

It's interesting to note that in 2003, we (as fans) were robbed of what would have been a truly epic World Series- Boston Red Sox vs. Chicago Cubs, one of those matchups that was literally "apocalyptic" joke fodder before 2004. While this year's matchup is nowhere near that level of crazed fandom and history-steeped baseball lore- as insomnyuk wryly notes with his "tv executive's eye view"- it is nevertheless comforting for beleagured fans everywhere that this year, yet again some team will end its long-time suffering. The White Sox haven't won since 1917, and haven't even been in a World Series since 1959; the Astros of course have never even been in the World Series before in their 44 year history as a franchise. After that Yankee domination to end the last millenium- for those less familiar with baseball history, the Yankee franchise is perhaps most famous for being a team that has no title in this entire millenium, despite spending nearly eight-tenths of a billion dollars in salary- it's nice to see that the 21st century has been so far much friendlier to title-less or long suffering franchises:

Year	Team	History
2004	Red Sox	The Red Sox finally and famously banish "the Curse", winning their first title in 86 years by defeating a St. Louis team that is, historically, the second winningest World Series team in history. It's worth noting though that, while a long time in coming, the Red Sox are in third place behind the Yankees and Cardinals for most WS Titles, with 26, 9, and 7 for the top 3.
2003	Florida Marlins	The Marlins, not exactly perennial contenders, defeat the vaunted New York Yankees. Although with two post-season appearances, and two WS titles to show for it, in only 11 years of otherwise sub-.500 play, their world-series-titles-to-seasons-played ratio is surpassed only by the Yankees themselves. So maybe we shouldn't call them "suffering" at all. :)
2002	Anaheim Angels	The (then) Anaheim Angels appear in and win their first ever World Series, over the San Francisco Giants. Neither team had ever won a World Series before (although the SF Giants did win 5 when the franchise was still in New York)
2001	Arizona Diamondbacks	The Arizona Diamondbacks win their first-ever title against the much feared New York Yankees, behind the stellar pitching of Schilling and Johnson. Like the Marlins then, it's hard to call them "long suffering" with only 4 years of existence before they won a title.

If you're curious, the following 9 teams have never won a World Series. Much harder luck cases exist, such as the Indians and Cubs to name two, where a team has gone far longer than these teams have even existed without winning the WS, but have a title or two from the early part of the 20th century to avoid this list.

Team	WS_Appearances	Notes
Tampa Bay Devil Rays	None	Formed as expansion franchise in 1998 along with the Arizona Diamondbacks (who won in only their 4th season). Have never made the post-season nor finished above .500.
Seattle Mariners	None	Formed in 1977 as an expansion franchise. There was a "Seattle Pilots" team for one year, in 1969, but that was moved to become the Milwaukee Brewers thanks to Bud Selig.
Texas Rangers	None	Formed in 1961 as the expansion Washington Senators. This is complicated: a different Senators franchise existed in Washington for many decades, and won a title in 1924. The owner relocated them to Minnesota as the Twins in 1961, but baseball immediately replaced them that same year with a new Washington Senators, who would then relocate to Texas in 1972 as the Texas Rangers.
Washington Nationals	None	As noted above with the Texas Rangers, an old Washington Senators franchise won in 1924, but the current Washington team traces back to the 1969 expansion Montreal Expos and obviously has never won a title.
Houston Astros	2005*	Obviously, Houston is making first WS appearance this year, with a chance to win their first ever title. Born as the Houston Colt .45's in 1962, renamed to the Astros in 1965.
Milwaukee Brewers	1982	As noted above, began as Seattle Pilots in 1969 until the vampiric Bud Selig spirited the franchise to Milwaukee. The city of Milwaukee did win a WS as the Milwaukee Braves in 1957, but that team was the former Boston Braves and later to become Atlanta Braves, and has no ties to the Milwaukee organization.
San Diego Padres	1984, 1998	Expansion team formed in 1969, they've made two WS appearances but come up empty handed each time.
San Francisco Giants	1989, 2002	So, the franchise had won 5 World Series as the storied New York Giants, and remained the same franchise when they moved to San Francisco. However, in San Francisco, they are 0-2 in WS appearances since their relocation in 1958. It's a debatable question, then, whether this team is title-less after all.
Colorado Rockies	None	Created in 1993 along with the Marlins as expansion franchise. Obviously, have had far less success than the Marlins in their 13 years in the league.

posted by hincandenza at 08:23 AM on October 20, 2005