Their Place in History

[DrungoHazewood]

Rank	Team	Year 1_W	Year  1_L	Yer 1_Pct	Year 2_W	Year 2_L	Year 2_Pct	Diff	W_diff		Notes
1	1890 Louisville	27	111	0.196	88	44	0.667	0.471	64		Players League chaos
2	1898 St. Louis	39	111	0.260	84	67	0.556	0.296	44.5		Syndicate ownership with Cleveland Spiders
3	1999 D'backs	65	97	0.401	100	62	0.617	0.216	35		Acquired R. Johnson, Finley, L. Gonzalez, B. Kim, A. Reynoso, Stottlemyre
4	1946 Red Sox	71	83	0.461	104	50	0.675	0.214	33		Williams, Dom DiMaggio, Doerr others came back from WWII
5	1936 Braves	38	115	0.248	71	83	0.461	0.213	32.5		Ruth retired in '35
6	1905 Phils	52	100	0.342	83	69	0.546	0.204	31		
7	1989 Orioles	54	107	0.335	87	75	0.537	0.202	32.5		
8	1962 Phils	47	107	0.305	81	80	0.503	0.198	30.5		
9	2022 Orioles	52	110	0.321	83	79	0.512	0.191	31		
10	1993 Giants	72	90	0.444	103	59	0.636	0.191	31		
11	2008 Rays	66	96	0.407	97	65	0.599	0.191	31		
12	1914 Cardinals	51	99	0.340	81	72	0.529	0.189	28.5		
13	1918 Pirates	51	103	0.331	65	60	0.520	0.189	28.5		WWI short schedule
14	1947 A's	49	105	0.318	78	76	0.506	0.188	29		

Sorry if the columns don't quite line up, this is pasted from an Excel spreadsheet.  It's sorted by difference in winning percentage to account for varying schedule lengths.

I'd ignore the first two, as 1800s circumstances are wildly different from today. The '46 Red Sox are a pretty unique situation, as they got Ted Freakin' Williams, HOFer Bobby Doerr and several others back from the war. The Why Not? Orioles beat the '22ers by 1.5 games.  Overall, they're tied for 5th-best leap forward since 1900 in terms of wins/losses, and 7th in winning percentage gain.

Not bad.  Not bad at all.

I have decent knowledge of most of the teams on this list, but I really have no idea about a few like the '05 Phils or the '14 Cards, '18 Pirates.  I'll have to do some digging.  Even after briefly looking at the '05 Phillies roster and transactions I don't see any obvious reason they leapt forward.

Edited October 6, 2022 by DrungoHazewood

[DrungoHazewood]

I noticed a typo. The 1936 Boston Braves should be '35.  The '34-'36 Braves are a really strange case.  The '34 Braves went 78-73-1, then collapsed to 38-115, then in '36 rebounded to 71-83-3.  All three years they had HOF manager Bill McKechnie.

In 1935 the major event was they signed 40-year-old Babe Ruth after the Yanks released him.  Ruth wanted to manage and apparently believed that he'd been promised the Braves' job, perhaps the next season.  But that didn't materialize, the already had a great manager, Ruth ends up retiring after less than two months, and the resulting circus seems to have tanked the team.

[Sports Guy]

How did these teams do the next year?

[Moose Milligan]

The Diamondbacks picked up Randy Johnson, Luiz Gonzalez and Steve Finley.  Pretty good offseason, I'd say.

[DrungoHazewood]

46 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

How did these teams do the next year?

I'm assigning that as your homework.  Please appropriately cite your sources.  Due 0800 Tuesday because of the holiday.

[Natty]

When has the lowest payroll team finished above .500?

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, Natty said:

When has the lowest payroll team finished above .500?

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see the A's, Rays and Marlins on a list of this type.

[Natty]

31 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see the A's, Rays and Marlins on a list of this type.

I certainly remember in the 2003,  when McKeon took the Marlins (54M) to the world series and beat the Yankees (164M).  

I dont think the Marlins were the lowest payroll that year, but they sure showed that big money can't buy you the world series. 

[Can_of_corn]

5 minutes ago, Natty said:

I certainly remember in the 2003,  when McKeon took the Marlins (54M) to the world series and beat the Yankees (164M).  

I dont think the Marlins were the lowest payroll that year, but they sure showed that big money can't buy you the world series. 

Going by the baseball cube.  (different sites list different numbers for payrolls)

First off they have the A's as having a lower payroll than the O's this year.

2019 Rays

2018 A's

2009 Marlins

2008 Marlins

2001 Twins

I stopped looking at this point.

 

[Natty]

17 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Going by the baseball cube.  (different sites list different numbers for payrolls)

First off they have the A's as having a lower payroll than the O's this year.

2019 Rays

2018 A's

2009 Marlins

2008 Marlins

2001 Twins

I stopped looking at this point.

 

Hey thanks for looking. I looked back at the spotrac list and you are right. The A's are even cheaper than us. Obviously things change during the season, because we were dead last earier in the season. 

[Frobby]

On 10/6/2022 at 9:48 AM, Sports Guy said:

How did these teams do the next year?

I was wondering the same thing, but I ain’t looking it up now that Drungo has assigned that job to you!  In any event, every team’s situation is different.  The 1990 O’s fell back 11 games.  The offense was 39 runs worse, the pitching was 12 runs worse.  From the standpoint of Pythagorean record, that was more like a 6-game drop than an 11-game drop.  From a WAR point of view, they were less than 3 WAR down from the year before.   But they were less clutch-y, with their RISP OPS down from .748 to .704.   
 

PS - I had forgotten, or never knew, that Billy Ripken had a 4.1 rWAR season in 1990.   

Edited October 7, 2022 by Frobby

[DrungoHazewood]

24 minutes ago, Frobby said:

PS - I had forgotten, or never knew, that Billy Ripken had a 4.1 rWAR season in 1990.   

Probably about as good as you can be as a second baseman with three homers and 28 walks.

So I had to look this up... that was the 6th-best season of all time among players who played 100+ games at second, had no more than four homers, or thirty walks.

But he was not even in the same solar system as numbers 1 and 2, who were both Nap Lajoie.  In aught-six he hit .355 with 48 doubles, nine triples, 20 steals, +20 glove, but just 30 walks and no homers, good for 10 wins.  The next year he hit .301 with a .742 OPS in a very down hitter's year, two homers, again exactly 30 walks and an almost unbelievable +27 glove, good for 7.6 wins.

Then we have the famous Sam Barkely, of Toledo in the 1884 AA with 4.7 wins.  The Browns' Del Pratt in 1915 with 4.7.  Dee Strange-Gordon's 2013 season with the Marlins.  Then Billy.

Doug Flynn appears on this list multiple times, all for seasons well below replacement.  The 60, 70s and 80s had some kind of weird fetish for playing A ball middle infielders in the Majors.