The Seattle Mariners need to be some of the irritating groups in Main League Baseball to cheer for.
There are undoubtedly worse groups and there are definitely worse conditions when it comes to possession, baseball operations and expertise ranges. There are groups and conditions which can be objectively unhealthy and even borderline hopeless.
The Mariners are by no means actually in that class.
They’ve some hope, they’ve some expertise and so they typically win sufficient video games to maintain issues attention-grabbing and maintain the workforce aggressive.
However they’re by no means fairly ok to recover from the hump and turn out to be a critical contender. The 2024 season has been one other chapter in that seemingly endless cycle of mediocrity.
The Mariners had been formally eradicated from American League playoff rivalry on Thursday, lacking the postseason regardless of holding a 10-game lead for a playoff spot at their excessive level for the season in mid-June.
The membership misplaced its division result in the Houston Astros and was finally overtaken within the wild-card race by the Kansas Metropolis Royals, Detroit Tigers and Minnesota Twins.
It doesn’t matter what the Mariners do over their remaining three video games of the common season they will end with a profitable document for the fourth yr in a row — and the seventh time prior to now 11 seasons relationship again to 2014. That isn’t a foul run.
However that stretch has additionally solely resulted in a single playoff berth, which appears nearly not possible to consider given what number of profitable data they’ve compiled.
Simply to place that into perspective, listed here are the highest 15 groups in wins (utilizing Baseball-Reference Stathead) because the begin of the 2014 season and the variety of playoff appearances every has had.
- Los Angeles Dodgers (1,033 wins): 11 playoffs
- Houston Astros (957 wins): 9 playoffs
- New York Yankees (947 wins): Eight playoffs
- Cleveland Guardians (921 wins): Six playoffs
- St. Louis Cardinals (903 wins): Six playoffs
- Tampa Bay Rays (894 wins): 5 playoffs
- Chicago Cubs: (887 wins): 5 playoffs
- Atlanta Braves (887 wins): Six playoffs
- Milwaukee Brewers (886 wins): Six playoffs
- Boston Crimson Sox (879 wins): 4 playoffs
- Seattle Mariners (861 wins) One playoff
- Toronto Blue Jays (859 wins): 5 playoffs
- New York Mets (855 wins): Three playoffs
- San Francisco Giants (848 wins): Three playoffs
- Washington Nationals (832 wins): 4 playoffs
Each different workforce within the high 15 in wins over these previous 11 seasons has made the playoffs at the very least thrice — aside from the Mariners, who stay caught on one. 12 of them have made the playoffs at the very least 4 occasions. That quantity may improve to 13 groups if the Mets earn a playoff spot this season.
Each workforce on that listing has performed in at the very least one league championship collection throughout that stretch — aside from the Mariners.
10 of these 15 groups have performed in at the very least one World Sequence. The Mariners haven’t.
Eight of these groups have gained at the very least one World Sequence. The Mariners haven’t.
There is a component of unhealthy luck at play right here to be so persistently aggressive and never have extra to point out for it. For as aggressive because the Mariners have been, although, they’ve by no means gained greater than 90 video games through the area in query, with their profitable seasons tending to take a seat between 84 and 90 wins. Good. Not nice. That appears to be the calling card of the Mariners group.
