The Chicago White Sox won’t be playing in the 2024 MLB playoffs. That’s not exactly news to anyone with more than a passing interest in baseball, but now we know for sure.
The White Sox were eliminated from the postseason on Saturday with a 6-1 loss to the Houston Astros, dropping their record to an MLB-worst 30-94. That puts them a staggering 38.5 games behind the third wild-card spot with 38 games remaining.
The second-lowest team in the AL standings is the Oakland Athletics at 53-70, a whopping 23.5 games ahead of Chicago.
If it sounds early for a team to be eliminated from the playoffs on Aug. 17, it is. It is the earliest a team has been eliminated from playoff contention since MLB’s divisional era began in 1969. The previous record holder was the 2018 Baltimore Orioles, who were eliminated on Aug. 20, finishing with a 47-115 record.
That Baltimore team, however, played during the era of two wild-card teams. MLB added the third wild-card team in 2022, which theoretically should have made it harder to get eliminated so early. In 2023, the first team eliminated was the A’s on Aug. 23, and even that felt strange. In 2022, it was the Washington Nationals on Sept. 6.
Unfortunately, that’s not the only history the White Sox have made this season, and there may be more to come. The team has already tied the American League record for consecutive losses with 21, and needs to win 11 more games to avoid tying the 1962 New York Mets for the most losses in MLB history.
Again, no one really needed objective evidence that the White Sox are a terrible team. They’ve been making that clear every night for 4 1/2 months now, and they’re even worse now than they were a month ago after selling big at the trade deadline.
But at least next year they’ll be cheaper to view in real life.
