You can start by thanking the Cleveland Indians. Or blaming them.
The 2005 edition of the Tribe capped the Hit List’s inaugural season with a dubious honor, finishing atop the final rankings but narrowly missing the playoffs after a collapse in the final week. This year, the Indians have been falling short again (must be drinking from the Cuyahoga). When Jim Baker analyzed them in a New York Sun piece a few weeks back, they were more than 12 games off of their third-order win projection, and they’re still in double digits.
That feat prompted Jim to ask the same question that I and several readers had asked at the end of last season: “How often does this happen?” Given the short history of the Adjusted Standings, which Clay Davenport introduced on May 1, 2003–making an example of the Indians, no less–nobody knew. Until now.
Clay got down to the dirty business of crunching the numbers needed to answer Jim’s query (only 18 teams have underperformed by more than 10 games over the course of a full season, and just a dozen have overperformed by 10), and as a byproduct, created Adjusted Standings data that goes all the way back to 1882, data which should hopefully make its way to our stats section in due time. Since the Adjusted Standings are the raw stuff of the Hit List, I’ve been able to create seasonal Hit List rankings going back to 1901, when the American League came into being (before then is too disorderly for my tastes, what with teams and leagues folding approximately every hour and rule changes happening every eleven minutes), and I can now answer many of the questions that readers have had about the list, and even some of my own. What follows here is something of an FAQ about those historical Hit Lists. If you need to brush up on the list’s methodology, see here; for this week’s list, see here.
Who’s finished #1 most often?
Not surprisingly, the answer is the same as “Who’s won the most World Series?” The New York Yankees have topped the historical Hit List 22 times, as compared to their 26 World Championships. Interestingly enough, they’ve topped the list only once during the Joe Torre era, in 1998, when they won an astounding 114 games. They’ve been in the Top Five every year but one during Torre’s tenure.
Team #1 Notes Yankees 22 Last time was '98 Athletics 10 Philadelphia 7, Oakland 3 Cardinals 7 Three straight during WWII Dodgers 7 Brooklyn 4, LA 3 (including strike-torn '81) Giants 7 New York 5, SF 2 Orioles 7 Baltimore 6, St. Louis Browns 1 Pirates 7 3x from 1901-1909, 3x since 1925 Indians 6 Three times in Jacobs Field era Cubs 5 Not since 1945 Red Sox 4 Not since 1946 Braves 3 All in Atlanta White Sox 3 Not since 1983 Reds 3 .658 HLF in 1975 Tigers 3 As expected: '34, '68, '84 Brewers 2 1992, missed postseason Twins 2 Minnesota 1, Washington 1 Angels 1 2002 Diamondbacks 1 1999, not 2001 Expos 1 Yes, 1994 Mets 1 1986, of course Phillies 1 Spirit of '76 Mariners 1 2001 Blue Jays 1 1987, not 1992 or '93
What’s the record for most consecutive #1s?
The record is four straight, and it’s been done three times. Two of those are by Yankee dynasties that should be familiar; the 1936-1939 edition, which went 16-3 in World Series play while marking the transition from the Lou Gehrig era to the Joe DiMaggio one, and the 1950-1953 one, which was part of Casey Stengel’s five straight World Championships. The missing team from that run was the ’49 squad, which placed third on the Hit List behind the Brooklyn Dodgers (whom they beat in the World Series) and the Boston Red Sox, who battled them until the season’s final day, as chronicled in David Halberstam’s Summer of ’49.
The third team to win four straight is the 1928-1931 Philadelphia A’s. Those teams met various fates; while the 1929 and 1930 squads won the World Series, the 1928 team didn’t even win the pennant, finishing three games behind the #2-ranked Yankees, who finished 7.7 games above their third-order winning percentage. The 1931 team lost the World Series to the #3-ranked Cardinals.
Four teams finished #1 three straight times: the 1969-1971 Orioles, the 1956-1958 Yankees, the 1988-1990 A’s, and the 1942-1944 St. Louis Cardinals. The O’s under Earl Weaver finished first again in 1973, tallying a remarkable four firsts in five years; there’s a reason we revere Weaver around here. And they also won in 1966 under Hank Bauer, so that’s five out of eight years. Meanwhile, the Cards’ accomplishment, which occurred during World War II, is considerably less impressive given how many stars around the league were serving in the military.
How often does the #1 team win the World Series?
The #1 team has won the World Series just under half the time, 48 out of 101 times. The #2 team has won it 23 times, meaning that the first or second-ranked team has won over 70 percent of the time. The #3 and #4 teams have won a combined 17 times, and all others have combined for 13. Here’s the breakdown:
Rk Champs 1 48 2 23 3 9 4 8 5 5 6 5 9 1 10 1 13 1
Who’s the lowest-ranked team to win a World Series?
The 1987 Minnesota Twins are the lucky #13 on the list above. Not only did they win just 85 games, fewest of any Series winner, their Hit List Factor–the average of their actual, first-, second- and third-order winning percentages–wasn’t even above .500, just a mere .497! They were outscored by 10 runs overall and finished 5.9 wins above their third-order winning percentage, but they offed Whitey Herzog’s Cardinals in seven games.
Taking the brown paper bags off the heads of the other low-ranked teams above, the 2000 Yankees are the #10 team; they won just 87 games on the year, but their low ranking is distorted by a hellaciously bad 3-15 finish in which they were outscored 148-59, a level of futility that invoked Cleveland Spiders comparisons at the time. Prior to that they’d won at a .587 clip, which would have been good for a #2 ranking had it held up across the other adjusted winning percentages; at worst they were probably a top-five team. The #9 winners are the 2003 Florida Marlins, a Wild Card team that slipped through.
Speaking of Wild Cards, what kind of rankings did the others who won a World Series end up with?
Two of the three other Wild-Cards-turned-champs were as legit as about two-thirds of the other winners. The 2002 Anaheim Angels of Joe Torre’s Nightmares finished Numero Uno, while those slayers of the Bambino’s ghost, the 2004 Red Sox, finished #2. The third, the first Marlins team to win, finished with a #6 ranking.
Has any #1 missed the playoffs like the Indians did last year?
It’s happened before, but only five other times. That’s about once every 17 years on average, but there was a 59-year gap between two such occurrences:
1908 New York Giants 1922 St. Louis Browns 1928 Philadelphia A's 1987 Toronto Blue Jays 1992 Milwaukee Brewers
Here we’ve got a couple of famous teams who ended up on the short ends of down-to-the-wire finishes. The 1908 Giants lost a thrilling race to the Cubs thanks to the legendary Merkle’s Boner, where a 19-year-old rookie failed to advance a base on an apparent game-winning hit; chaos ensued, forcing a tie game that had to be made up, and things didn’t go the Giants’ way. More recently, Jimy Williams’ 1987 Blue Jays tanked during the season’s final week, losing their last seven games, four of them by a single run and none by more than three; the Tigers took the AL East title with three straight one-run victories over the Jays in the season’s final weekend.
In a rare burst of competence, the 1922 St. Louis Browns, led by .420-hitting George Sisler, lost the AL race by a single game to the Yankees. The ’92 Brewers got off to a 12-16 start, then clawed their way back into the race, but ultimately came up short as the Jays won.
What would the all-time Hit List look like?
Here’s the top 40, representing less than the top two percent of the 2,132 teams post-1900 (O-Rk is overall rank, Rk is rank that season):
O-Rk YEAR RK TM W L HLF -------------------------------------- 1. 1906 1 CHN 115 36 .742 2. 1902 1 PIT 102 36 .733 3. 1939 1 NYA 106 45 .725 4. 1927 1 NYA 110 44 .712 5. 1909 1 PIT 111 42 .693 6. 1909 2 CHN 104 49 .688 7. 1904 1 NY1 106 46 .687 8. 2001 1 SEA 116 46 .687 9. 1944 1 SLN 105 49 .687 10. 1942 1 SLN 106 48 .687 11. 1942 2 NYA 103 51 .686 12. 1905 1 NY1 105 47 .683 13. 1998 1 NYA 114 48 .682 14. 1954 1 CLE 111 43 .677 15. 1929 1 PHA 104 46 .676 16. 1969 1 BAL 109 53 .673 17. 1910 1 PHA 102 48 .673 18. 1936 1 NYA 102 51 .671 19. 1912 1 BOS 105 47 .671 20. 1937 1 NYA 103 52 .667 21. 1907 1 CHN 108 44 .665 22. 1912 2 NY1 103 48 .663 23. 1932 1 NYA 108 47 .661 24. 1953 1 NYA 99 52 .661 25. 1942 3 BRO 104 50 .660 26. 1948 1 CLE 97 58 .659 27. 1931 1 PHA 107 45 .658 28. 1995 1 CLE 100 44 .658 29. 1975 1 CIN 108 54 .658 30. 1901 1 PIT 90 49 .658 31. 1911 1 PHA 101 50 .658 32. 1910 2 CHN 104 50 .656 33. 1954 2 NYA 103 51 .655 34. 1943 1 SLN 105 49 .655 35. 1919 1 CIN 96 44 .655 36. 1998 2 ATL 106 56 .655 37. 1953 2 BRO 105 49 .655 38. 1935 1 CHN 100 54 .651 39. 1905 2 CHN 92 61 .650 40. 1903 1 BOS 91 47 .649
And here’s the dregs of society:
O-Rk YEAR RK TM W L HLF --------------------------------------- 1. 1916 16 PHA 36 117 .267 2. 1942 16 PHI 42 109 .274 3. 1904 16 WS1 38 113 .278 4. 1909 16 WS1 42 110 .286 5. 1919 16 PHA 36 104 .287 6. 1915 16 PHA 43 109 .290 7. 1932 16 BOS 43 111 .291 8. 2003 30 DET 43 119 .292 9. 1962 20 NYN 40 120 .296 10. 1910 16 SLA 47 107 .301 11. 1941 16 PHI 43 111 .302 12. 1945 16 PHI 46 108 .304 13. 1908 16 SLN 49 105 .305 14. 1954 16 PHA 51 103 .305 15. 1905 16 BRO 48 104 .307 16. 1952 16 PIT 42 112 .307 17. 1939 16 PHI 45 106 .307 18. 1903 16 SLN 43 94 .308 19. 1935 16 BSN 38 115 .309 20. 1903 15 WS1 43 94 .312 21. 1969 24 SDN 52 110 .313 22. 1909 15 BSN 45 108 .313 23. 1938 16 PHI 45 105 .313 24. 1911 16 BSN 44 107 .318 25. 1906 16 BSN 49 102 .318 26. 1963 20 NYN 51 111 .319 27. 1905 15 BSN 51 103 .319 28. 1928 16 PHI 43 109 .320 29. 1926 16 BOS 46 107 .322 30. 1965 20 NYN 50 112 .322 31. 1920 16 PHA 48 106 .324 32. 1908 15 NYA 51 103 .325 33. 1939 15 SLA 43 111 .325 34. 1906 15 BOS 49 105 .326 35. 1924 16 BSN 53 100 .326 36. 1940 16 PHI 50 103 .326 37. 2002 30 DET 55 106 .326 38. 1937 16 SLA 46 108 .326 39. 1954 15 PIT 53 101 .327 40. 1979 26 OAK 54 108 .327 41. 1921 16 PHI 51 103 .327 42. 2004 30 ARI 51 111 .327
Yeesh, I didn’t ask for your life story; I can barely remember what I had for breakfast, let alone 1909. What if we limit the best and worst to post-World War II?
Some interesting teams pop up here. Note the presence of three Cleveland clubs in the top seven–it’s definitely the water–the back-to-back Big Red Machine of 1975-1976, the aforementioned Weaver mini-dynasty of 1969-1971, the presence of three of Bobby Cox’s Braves teams and three teams from the fabled 1998 season:
O-Rk YEAR RK TM W L HLF -------------------------------------- 1. 2001 1 SEA 116 46 .687 2. 1998 1 NYA 114 48 .682 3. 1954 1 CLE 111 43 .677 4. 1969 1 BAL 109 53 .673 5. 1953 1 NYA 99 52 .661 6. 1948 1 CLE 97 58 .659 7. 1995 1 CLE 100 44 .658 8. 1975 1 CIN 108 54 .658 9. 1954 2 NYA 103 51 .655 10. 1998 2 ATL 106 56 .655 11. 1953 2 BRO 105 49 .655 12. 1970 1 BAL 108 54 .647 13. 1998 3 HOU 102 60 .646 14. 1974 1 LAN 102 60 .645 15. 1971 1 BAL 101 57 .642 16. 2001 2 OAK 102 60 .642 17. 1961 1 NYA 109 53 .642 18. 1947 1 NYA 97 57 .642 19. 1986 1 NYN 108 54 .640 20. 1993 1 ATL 104 58 .638 21. 1946 1 BOS 104 50 .638 22. 1976 1 PHI 101 61 .635 23. 1956 1 NYA 97 57 .634 24. 1976 2 CIN 102 60 .633 25. 1949 1 BRO 97 57 .633 26. 1997 1 ATL 101 61 .633 27. 1999 1 ARI 100 62 .631 28. 1949 2 BOS 96 58 .630 29. 1968 1 DET 103 59 .630 30. 1957 1 NYA 96 58 .630
As for the bottom dwellers, while the Tigers may have shed the top spot this week, it’s still pretty incredible to think of how far they’ve come in less than three full seasons:
O-Rk YEAR RK TM W L HLF --------------------------------------- 1. 2003 30 DET 43 119 .292 2. 1962 20 NYN 40 120 .296 3. 1954 16 PHA 51 103 .305 4. 1952 16 PIT 42 112 .307 5. 1969 24 SDN 52 110 .313 6. 1963 20 NYN 51 111 .319 7. 1965 20 NYN 50 112 .322 8. 2002 30 DET 55 106 .326 9. 1954 15 PIT 53 101 .327 10. 1979 26 OAK 54 108 .327 11. 2004 30 ARI 51 111 .327 12. 1949 16 WS1 50 104 .328 13. 1974 24 SDN 60 102 .333 14. 1996 28 DET 53 109 .335 15. 1953 16 PIT 50 104 .337 16. 1951 16 SLA 52 102 .339 17. 1948 16 CHA 51 101 .339 18. 1988 26 BAL 54 107 .342 19. 1979 25 TOR 53 109 .344 20. 1998 30 FLO 54 108 .349 21. 1961 18 PHI 47 107 .350 22. 1963 19 WS2 56 106 .352 23. 1953 15 SLA 54 100 .354 24. 1981 26 TOR 37 69 .354 25. 1956 16 WS1 59 95 .355 26. 1950 16 PHA 52 102 .355 27. 1949 15 SLA 53 101 .356 28. 1969 23 MON 52 110 .356 29. 1964 20 NYN 53 109 .356 30. 2002 29 TBA 55 106 .357
What about an all-time franchise ranking?
Hearkening back to an era when a triumvirate of New York teams ruled the baseball world, the all-time franchise rankings have the Yankees, Giants and Dodgers atop the list. Again, those pesky Indians are near the top, and even the Pirates manage to overcome their recent poor performance. On the other hand, relatively successful teams like the Orioles, A’s and Braves are weighted down by long stretches of poor performance in St. Louis, Philadelphia, Kansas City and Boston. Meanwhile at the bottom, the Devil Rays are hell and gone from any other team in terms of futility, but the Phillies, with over a century of baseball under their belts, really ought to know better.
RK TM HLF ---------------- 1. NYA .563 2. SFN .538 3. LAN .519 4. SLN .517 5. PIT .515 6. BOS .514 7. CLE .509 8. CHA .507 9. CHN .506 10. DET .505 11. ARI .503 12. HOU .501 13. CIN .501 14. TOR .496 15. KCA .490 16. ANA .489 17. OAK .484 18. ATL .483 19. WAS .483 20. NYN .482 21. MIN .481 22. BAL .478 23. MIL .478 24. SEA .476 25. TEX .470 26. FLO .469 27. COL .467 28. PHI .462 29. SDN .459 30. TBA .407
I hope you enjoyed this little look at Hit List history as much as I did; we might have to dig this out come wintertime when there are no new Hit Lists to file. Again, a special thanks to Clay Davenport for taking the time to crunch all of the numbers necessary to create the Adjusted Standings and thus the Hit Lists.
Thank you for reading
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