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Pole To Pole (In Honor of Ricky Bobby)
2006-08-02 22:19
by Mike Carminati

I continue to play around with Retrosheet data and here's something that, though I have heard allusions to, I have never seen a definitive list of. Here is the list of teams that lead their league or division from the first day of the season to the last. Note that only four of the nine that played since 1903, the first year the World Series was played, won the Series:

TeamYrLgDivWLPCTG AheadWon Lg?Won WS?
Chicago White Sox2005ALC9963.61115YY
San Francisco Giants2003NLW10061.6214.5NN
Seattle Mariners2001ALW11646.71619NN
Cleveland Indians1998ALC8973.54915NN
Baltimore Orioles1997ALE9864.6055NN
Cincinnati Reds1990NLW9171.5622YY
Detroit Tigers1984ALE10458.6429YY
New York Yankees1927AL 11044.71414YY
New York Giants1923NL 9558.62115.5YN
Boston Red Stockings1875NA 718.8996YN/A

Now, here's something that I don't think has even been alluded to, the list of teams that was in last in their division/league from the start to the end of the season. This includes teams tied for the bottom slot in their division/league. As long as no other team had a worse record on any given day of the season.

Here they are, the pole-to-pole last place teams:

TeamYrLgDivWLPCTPOSGB
Detroit Tigers2003ALC43119.265547
Arizona Diamondbacks1998NLW6597.401533
San Diego Padres1994NLW4770.402413
Baltimore Orioles1988ALE54107.335735
Philadelphia Phillies1942NL 42109.278863
Boston Red Sox1932AL 43111.279864
Washington Senators1904AL 38113.252856
Louisville Colonels1896NL 3893.2901253
Detroit Wolverines1884NL 2884.250856
Philadelphia Quakers1883NL 1781.173846

God, I love this stuff.

Comments
2006-08-02 22:25:08
1.   das411
Haha, I loved 2003! What a fun season that was...
2006-08-03 06:08:08
2.   markh
The Indians went pole to pole in 1998, yet only won 89 games? Talk about having a down year in your division...
2006-08-03 08:51:14
3.   underdog
1 2003 was fun but my favorite is still the 1884 season. Those Wolverines were so atrocious to watch.
2006-08-03 10:22:37
4.   doncoffin
What I find interesting is the 42-year gap in pole-to-pole losers, from the '42 Phillies to the '88 Orioles...even the '62 Mets escaped this.

In addition, there's the 57-year gap between the '27 Yankees and the '84 Tigers. None of the Yankee teams in that stretch managed to lead wire-to-wire?

Also, wire-to-wire winners have become more common in the era of Division play (7 of the ten), while only 4 of the ten wire-to-wire losers have come in the Division play era.

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