11/21/24
November 02, 2017
Astros Win World Series: The Houston Astros won the first World Series in the history of the franchise, defeating the Los Angeles Dodgers 5-1 in game 7. The Astros scored 5 runs off starter Yu Darvish, who was pulled in the second inning. Houston's win makes a 2014 Sports Illustrated prophetic. The magazine called the team "Your 2017 World Series Champs" on the cover.
Detroit: 1968 riots, World Series win.
posted by MeatSaber at 07:52 AM on November 02, 2017
Of course, there is the exception to the rule:
New York : 9/11 and choking in the 9th inning of Game 7 of the World Series
posted by grum@work at 08:38 AM on November 02, 2017
San Diego: awesome weather all the time, never had a really serious earthquake: never won a damn thing.
posted by LionIndex at 09:31 AM on November 02, 2017
posted by yerfatma at 09:48 AM on November 02, 2017
Boston Marathon bombings followed by a Red Sox World Series win, not to mention the David Ortiz "This is our fu$#+-ng city" speech.
posted by Howard_T at 10:22 AM on November 02, 2017
San Diego: awesome weather all the time, never had a really serious earthquake: never won a damn thing.
posted by grum@work at 11:40 AM on November 02, 2017
What an entertaining Series--congrats to the Astros and their long suffering fan.
posted by tahoemoj at 11:53 AM on November 02, 2017
So the list of teams that have never won a world series is now down to seven: Texas, Seattle, Milwaukee, San Diego, Colorado, Washington/Montreal, and Tampa.
It was a fun series this year, even if game 7 was kind of anti-climatic. Congrats to Houston and their fans (except Gurriel...fuck that guy).
posted by Ufez Jones at 12:02 PM on November 02, 2017
Of the seven franchises listed by ufez, only Seattle and Washington/Montreal have never made it to the World Series.
By the way, MLB seems to be on some sort of amazing run of killing off "never won a title in a long time" stories. Since 2002 (16 World Series), the following has happened:
Cubs (108 years)
White Sox (88 years)
Red Sox (86 years)
Giants (66 years)
Angels (41 years)
Astros (55 years)
(Those teams have now won 10 of the last 16 World Series.)
As well, Cleveland had two "golden pitches" to end a 69 year drought last year, and the Rangers were TWICE a strike away from ending a 50 year drought in 2011 (and it was their second straight year in the World Series).
Those eight teams (six winners, two losers) had the longest World Series droughts as of 2002 (when it all started).
This gives hope to Washington and Seattle to make it to the World Series next year.
Personally, I'll just wait for Ben Reiter to tell me who is going to win in 2021.
posted by grum@work at 12:22 PM on November 02, 2017
So the list of teams that have never won a world series is now down to seven: Texas, Seattle, Milwaukee, San Diego, Colorado, Washington/Montreal, and Tampa.
Has Texas, by virtue of being twice a strike away, suffered the most on that list? I vote yes.
posted by rcade at 04:02 PM on November 02, 2017
Has Texas, by virtue of being twice a strike away, suffered the most on that list? I vote yes.
If we extend the range of time back to include the 1997 World Series, that's another blown game-7 9th-inning lead for Cleveland.
posted by bender at 04:31 PM on November 02, 2017
Has Texas, by virtue of being twice a strike away, suffered the most on that list? I vote yes.
Is what Texas gone through worse than what Seattle has gone through (2001 season, never even MADE the World Series, had 4 HOF-level players* together on the team for a 3 year span and the best they can do is win 1 game in the playoffs)?
Texas got to the summit..they just couldn't plant their flag. Seattle has never left base camp.
* Alex Rodriguez, Randy Johnson, Edgar Martinez, Ken Griffey Jr from 1996-1998
posted by grum@work at 04:51 PM on November 02, 2017
By the way, SI writers are actually getting pretty good at this "look ahead in 4 years thing".
From a March 2011 article, Pos pretends to be looking back at the Royals history from the far ahead future:
The biggest problem then, strange as it may seem now (we are talking about the three-time-champion Royals), was that Kansas City had trouble finding, developing and affording good players. How did it turn around? How did the Royals reach the playoffs in 2013, win the World Series in '15 and then dominate the latter part of the decade? Well, it was that minor league system ... that amazing Kansas City Royals minor league system.
posted by grum@work at 10:59 PM on November 02, 2017
This gives hope to Washington and Seattle to make it to the World Series next year.
No, as a former Expos fan who now follows the Mariners it would need a lot more than that to give us hope. Have you seen the state of the Mariners for the last 15 years?
posted by deflated at 11:33 AM on November 03, 2017
Texas got to the summit..they just couldn't plant their flag. Seattle has never left base camp.
I think it's harder to get close and fail than to never get there at all. One strike! I see Nelson Cruz baby-arming that fly ball in my nightmares. He jumps like he's avoiding a collision with the wall and he's not even close to it.
posted by rcade at 09:44 PM on November 03, 2017
Congrats Astros.
Wondering how many times a city or country's difficulties have been followed by sporting success. Obviously there is a varying degree of scale with the misfortunes involved.
Houston: Hurricane Harvey and World Series
Japan: earthquake and Women's WC championship
Manchester England: terror bombing and Man United Europa League title
New Orleans: Hurricane Katrina and Super Bowl win (5 year gap there)
Oakland - San Francisco: Loma Prieta Earthquake and World Series (tough to be the loser of that one)
St. Louis: 2011 Missouri tornadoes, World Series win
Those are a few that come to mind. There are no doubt many more. As well as devastating disappointments, such as the Yankees not winning the WS after the Sept. 11 attacks.