The Arizona Diamondbacks tied the Baltimore Orioles for the worst record in baseball. Nevertheless, let’s hand out some awards to put a positive spin on a dismal season.
The Minnesota Twins were expected to win the AL Central this season or at least battle the Chicago White Sox for the top spot. That’s not quite how it went down. Let’s recap their season and hand out a few awards.
The Minnesota Twins finished the season with 101 wins crossing the 100-win mark for just the second time ever (102 wins in 1965). The Bomba Squad set the Major League record for homers in a season with 307, but they couldn’t get past their playoff kryptonite in the New York Yankees and fell 3-0 in the ALDS. Let’s take a look at how the season went, and what’s on the horizon for the Twins.
The Nationals did it. They did the unpredictable (although our very own John Lepore predicted it prior to the season, so ask him for the lottery numbers) and won their first World Series. They overcame every obstacle imaginable to do it, from starting the season 19-31 to winning the Wild Card game in come-from-behind fashion against Reliever of the Year Josh Hader to beating the extremely tough competition in the Dodgers and Astros in seven games, and more. So how did the Nationals overcome all the odds (0.1% chance to win the World Series in May) to win it all? Let’s get further into their season.
In the middle of July, things seemed great on the North Side. The Cubs were leading the division by multiple games and it seemed as if the Cubs were going to cruise to a division title… until the bottom fell out and the Cardinals ended up division champs. Joe Maddon jumped ship and the North Side is now asking the question, “How do we get back to 2016?”
Bryce Harper entered, for a massive 13-year, $330 million contract, and expectations for the 2019 Phillies skyrocketed. A lot of people picked the Phillies to win the NL East after the signing, but instead they literally had an average season, finishing at .500 (81-81) and fourth in the division. Not only that but to add salt to the $330 million wound, the Phillies and Harper had to watch the Harper-less Nationals take a crazy route on the way to winning their first World Series in team history. More on the Nationals Cinderella-type season in their recap coming soon.
Any season that ends without hoisting the Commissioner’s Trophy for the New York Yankees is considered a disappoint. So when the Yankees lost to the Astros in six games in the American League Championship Series, there was obviously a lot of disappointment. But that doesn’t mean it was a complete and utter failure of a 2019 season. Let’s delve further into the Yankees’ 2019 season and what to look forward to for 2020.
The Kansas City Royals finished the season 59-103. While they weren’t in the basement of the American League Central, they did have the fourth-worst record in the Major Leagues. This bodes well as they will have the fourth pick in the Amateur Draft come June of 2020. The Royals are going to need prospects like that to pan out if they hope to reach the pinnacle of the sport as they did just four years ago.
The Toronto Blue Jays entered the 2019 season with low expectations in a rebuilding year, so their 67-95 record was not surprising. The bright spot of the season was the development of promising young hitters like Bo Bichette, Lourdes Gurriel Jr., Cavan Biggio, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. The lackluster performance by the starting rotation was the main negative of this past year. Let’s delve further into Year Two of the rebuild for the Blue Jays.
No one teases their fan base quite like the Mets do. My first two articles for this site came earlier this year in March and April if my memory serves me correctly. It was a time of optimism, a time of hope, a “let’s see what happens” kind of thing with mild to moderate expectations. Needless to say, I was disappointed. But the Mets have reasons for some optimism.
Another year goes by, but the collapse in the 2016 World Series still stings for the Cleveland Indians. After winning 22 straight in 2017, and winning their third straight division title in 2018, the Indians failed to make the playoffs in 2019.
The 2019 Regular Season is over and the Arizona Diamondbacks have missed the playoffs for the second year in a row. They have not clinched a National League West title since 2013, an NLCS since 2007, or a World Series title since 2001. We will recap the 2019 season and what to look forward to for the 2020 season.
The Arizona Diamondbacks tied the Baltimore Orioles for the worst record in baseball. Nevertheless, let’s hand out some awards to put a positive spin on a dismal season.
The Minnesota Twins were expected to win the AL Central this season or at least battle the Chicago White Sox for the top spot. That’s not quite how it went down. Let’s recap their season and hand out a few awards.
The Minnesota Twins finished the season with 101 wins crossing the 100-win mark for just the second time ever (102 wins in 1965). The Bomba Squad set the Major League record for homers in a season with 307, but they couldn’t get past their playoff kryptonite in the New York Yankees and fell 3-0 in the ALDS. Let’s take a look at how the season went, and what’s on the horizon for the Twins.
The Nationals did it. They did the unpredictable (although our very own John Lepore predicted it prior to the season, so ask him for the lottery numbers) and won their first World Series. They overcame every obstacle imaginable to do it, from starting the season 19-31 to winning the Wild Card game in come-from-behind fashion against Reliever of the Year Josh Hader to beating the extremely tough competition in the Dodgers and Astros in seven games, and more. So how did the Nationals overcome all the odds (0.1% chance to win the World Series in May) to win it all? Let’s get further into their season.
In the middle of July, things seemed great on the North Side. The Cubs were leading the division by multiple games and it seemed as if the Cubs were going to cruise to a division title… until the bottom fell out and the Cardinals ended up division champs. Joe Maddon jumped ship and the North Side is now asking the question, “How do we get back to 2016?”
Bryce Harper entered, for a massive 13-year, $330 million contract, and expectations for the 2019 Phillies skyrocketed. A lot of people picked the Phillies to win the NL East after the signing, but instead they literally had an average season, finishing at .500 (81-81) and fourth in the division. Not only that but to add salt to the $330 million wound, the Phillies and Harper had to watch the Harper-less Nationals take a crazy route on the way to winning their first World Series in team history. More on the Nationals Cinderella-type season in their recap coming soon.
Any season that ends without hoisting the Commissioner’s Trophy for the New York Yankees is considered a disappoint. So when the Yankees lost to the Astros in six games in the American League Championship Series, there was obviously a lot of disappointment. But that doesn’t mean it was a complete and utter failure of a 2019 season. Let’s delve further into the Yankees’ 2019 season and what to look forward to for 2020.
The Kansas City Royals finished the season 59-103. While they weren’t in the basement of the American League Central, they did have the fourth-worst record in the Major Leagues. This bodes well as they will have the fourth pick in the Amateur Draft come June of 2020. The Royals are going to need prospects like that to pan out if they hope to reach the pinnacle of the sport as they did just four years ago.
The Toronto Blue Jays entered the 2019 season with low expectations in a rebuilding year, so their 67-95 record was not surprising. The bright spot of the season was the development of promising young hitters like Bo Bichette, Lourdes Gurriel Jr., Cavan Biggio, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. The lackluster performance by the starting rotation was the main negative of this past year. Let’s delve further into Year Two of the rebuild for the Blue Jays.
No one teases their fan base quite like the Mets do. My first two articles for this site came earlier this year in March and April if my memory serves me correctly. It was a time of optimism, a time of hope, a “let’s see what happens” kind of thing with mild to moderate expectations. Needless to say, I was disappointed. But the Mets have reasons for some optimism.
Another year goes by, but the collapse in the 2016 World Series still stings for the Cleveland Indians. After winning 22 straight in 2017, and winning their third straight division title in 2018, the Indians failed to make the playoffs in 2019.
The 2019 Regular Season is over and the Arizona Diamondbacks have missed the playoffs for the second year in a row. They have not clinched a National League West title since 2013, an NLCS since 2007, or a World Series title since 2001. We will recap the 2019 season and what to look forward to for the 2020 season.
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