THE BEST AND WORST BASEBALL WORLD SERIES WINNERS

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Baseball is a brutal sport. It starts with 162 games in a season, in which it’s pretty much open to anyone, and then ends with a short best-of-five pitting a few teams against each other in an epic tournament. To be honest, while the title is ‘best and worst’, it should really only be worst. If the best team wins, and the majority of people agree that it is the best, then it is expected that they’ll win. No eyebrows get raised there – not even those of the losers.

However, the best team does not always win. Sometimes it is the least expected team that sails through to claim the title, and such teams raise everyone’s eyebrows. Even with the most advanced machine learning based statistics, you just couldn’t predict it! All that’s needed is a single mistake, or series of mistakes, and everyone’s favorite team loses any chance at the title. For that reason, the most unlikely teams win the World Series far more often than you might expect. We’ll be looking at the top 5 today. Get comfortable, and maybe get some assignment writing help to free your time. You’ll need lots of time to take this in.

  1. New York Yankees in 2000

Before the Yankees had their run in 2000, they really weren’t a favorite. I mean sure, they made a lot of great runs, as good as any other team, but their pitching was rather off, with just a 4.76 combined ERA. The only good pitcher on the team was Roger Clemens, who managed an ERA of 3.70 across 32 games. His teammates Andy Petttitte, David Cone, Denny Neagle, and Orlando Hernandez. By the time they were making it to the playoffs, they were a mere 87-74.

In the postseason, however, things got interesting. They beat the Oakland A’s in the best-of-five run – while losing the only two games that were started by Roger Clemens, their saving grace. They then went on to beat the Seattle Mariners and then met the New York Mets. Through a series of blunders, they managed to beat the Mets 4 to 1.

  1. Florida Marlins in 2003

The Florida Marlins were quite unpredictable in the 2003 season. By the time they went into the postseason they had won 91 games and were mostly considered mediocre. In the postseason, they went on to play the Chicago Cubs. The Cubs started as the favorites, with a 3-1 lead in the best-of-seven. However, Josh Becket denied them a win in game 5. They started with a lead in the sixth game but were once more stymied, this time by Mark Prior. In game 7 the Marlins all but dominated them. Josh Becket kept his great streak going against the New York Yankees in the World Series and the Marlins won it yet again. The interesting part is that, with most of the same players in the next year, they barely won 83 games and didn’t as much as get a whiff of the postseason.

  1. San Francisco Giants in 2014

To be honest, when the 2014 season was starting the San Francisco Giants looked like a pretty strong team. They had a 43-21 streak and had 10 games on the Los Angeles Dodgers by June 8. However, they went on to lose the division, finishing six games shy of the Dodgers with a record that had morphed into 88-74. They did however present a suitable match for the Pittsburgh Pirates in the wild card game.

Their pitcher was Madison Bumgarner, and he did pretty well. Out of 14 pitches, he had 10 strikeouts. They went on to dominate the Washington Nationals and the St. Louis Cardinals almost effortlessly, then faced off with the Kansas City Royals in the World Series. This meeting dragged on for 7 games, with Tim Hudson playing for the Giants in the seventh game and Jeremy Guthrie playing for the Pirates.

The Giants had to pull out Hudson, who wasn’t playing his best. They brought in Bumgarner, who pitched 5 more innings. He allowed no runs and just two hits. He struck out four of them. As history would have it, the Giants won the World Series and Madison Bumgarner went on to become MVP.

  1. St. Louis Cardinals in 2006

The St. Louis Cardinals are statistically considered to be the worst team ever to win the World Series. They didn’t have a remote chance to win. That’s one hell of an accolade! By 2006, they had been on a winning streak, having won 105 games in 2004 and 100 in 2005. It was therefore a little surprising when they only managed a meager 83-78 in 2006. The good news for them was that everyone else seemed to be having just as bad a season, and they emerged top in the division.

In the NLDS they faced off against the San Diego Padres, who weren’t much better than them. The Cardinals won and proceeded to the NLCS, where they met the New York Mets. The games were pretty intense, and went on to a seventh, where Yadier Molina hit two home runs. The Cardinals won and then went on to meet the Detroit Tigers in the World Series, winning.

  1. Minnesota Twins in 1987

The Minnesota Twins of 1987 are yet another team that had no business winning the World Series. Their biggest problem was their pitching. They had a combined ERA of just 4.63. They defeated the Detroit Tigers, who were clearly the Goliath to their David, in the ALCS, and then went on to face off against the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series. They Cards won 3 games and had just one more to win to beat the Twins. However, the Twins beat them to a 4-2 win and won the series.

Conclusion

Baseball is a beautiful game, whether you’re a pundit, ardent speculator, or just like to kick back and enjoy it after a long day. Part of its appeal is how often it can subvert our most obvious expectations. Hopefully, the freaks of history above will inspire you to appreciate the game a little more than you have so far.

 

Author Bio

Arthur Evans is a professional freelance writer working for an A-grade essay company called Write My Essay UK. His job is to coordinate with students, understand their thesis, dissertation requirements, write, and deliver premium-quality work within the deadline. He also likes to build ecommerce sites in his free time, using platforms ranging from WooCommerce to Shopify. Feel free to contact him via Twitter.