The Chicago White Sox media department had to dust off its “SOX WIN” tweet Wednesday after the team tasted victory for just the third time this season.
In the second game of a doubleheader against the visiting Kansas City Royals, the Chicago White Sox powered to a 2-1 win on the strength of a Gavin Sheets sixth-inning home run.
It was the first time that the team left the field with heads held high since a 7-5 defeat of the Cleveland Guardians on April 9. The only other win this season for the sorrowful ballclub was a 3-2 defeat of the Atlanta Braves on April 2.
Chicago White Sox Losing at a Record-Shattering Pace
The win upped the Chicago White Sox 2024 record to 3-15 on the year. The team has half the wins of the next-worst team in the American League. In MLB, only the Miami Marlins and Colorado Rockies — each with four wins — are rivaling the Southsiders futility so far.
With its current record, the Chicago White Sox are on a pace to go 27-135. That is a record that would pulverize the current MLB-worst mark over a 162-game season. That ignominious honor currently is held by the 2003 Detroit Tigers, who went 43-119.
It’s also a pace that comes close to rivaling the nearly untouchable worst MLB record of all time. That mark is still held by the 1899 Cleveland Spiders. In the midst of the William McKinley’s presidency, the Spiders went 20-134.
Winning just 20 games in a season is a near-impossibility, as Cleveland did it in 154 games. Even the Chicago White Sox current winning percentage of .167 tops the Spiders winning at a .130 clip.
At Some Point, the Chicago White Sox Will Likely Win a Few More Games
It’s really difficult to be historically awful. Even last season’s putrid Oakland Athletics managed to go 50-112. The A’s started out winning just 10 of their first 50 games and still put together a few winning streaks to take 40 of the remaining 112 contests.
However, at the Chicago White Sox’s current pace, the team will win just eight of its first 50 games. That is just one game better than the current record for fewest wins over that span — held by the 1897 Louisville Colonels, who went 7-43 to start that campaign. The Colonels folded two seasons later, the same year that the Spiders made the wrong kind of MLB history.
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Tom Carothers is a sportswriter with more than 20 years of experience covering sports at the high school, collegiate, and professional levels. Still longing for the return of his Minnesota North Stars, he has a high pain tolerance as a big fan of the Chicago Cubs, Cleveland Browns, and Tottenham Hotspur.
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