David Levine
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The worst division in MLB history? Welcome to a weekend in the AL Central
The Athletic MLB Staff
Welcome to another weekend in the AL Central, the home of the youngest, the least experienced and the sorriest this league has to offer, where on-field ineptitude may be sinking to historic depths. The 2023 quintet is on pace to produce the worst combined record of MLB’s divisional era, which began in 1969.
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Before this year, the 2018 season held the record for the worst division in history, when — you guessed it — the AL Central mustered a combined winning percentage of only .436. This year’s AL Central has a combined winning percentage of .433. Four of the division’s five teams have losing records, and they have combined for a run differential of minus-334. Only the fourth-place White Sox ranked higher than 15th in Opening Day payroll.
In Chicago, that team has suffered a cultural implosion, its season defined by its struggling shortstop absorbing a right hook to the face amid a brouhaha in Cleveland.
In last place, the 40-86 Royals have baseball’s second-worst record, ahead of only the dismal Oakland Athletics. Even as shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. plays like a budding star, the Royals have not had a .500 record since 2016 and have found few signs of hope. MLB Pipeline recently ranked the Royals’ farm system 29th out of 30 organizations, and the Royals do not have a single Top 100 prospect.
And as for the division leader?
The 65-60 Twins hold a six-game edge on the Guardians. Minnesota’s lineup has struggled, ranking eighth in OPS and ninth in runs per game among AL teams. But when compared to their four division rivals — the league’s lowest-scoring non-Oakland lineups — the Twins resemble a powerhouse, even though they might break MLB’s all-time strikeout record.
Yet even when they falter, it hardly matters. Seven of the Twins’ last 10 losses have come on days when the Guardians have also lost, thus increasing Minnesota’s chances of winning the division by simply erasing another game from the respective schedules.
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Minnesota failing to make any trades at the deadline took people in the game by surprise given the season-long need for bullpen help and a right-handed-hitting corner outfielder. Those are two seemingly easy boxes to check inexpensively, yet the Twins stood pat — and watched their odds of winning the division actually increase.
Why? Because the other four teams were sellers.
“Certainly, we’re very much aware of what every other club is doing,” said Twins president of baseball operations Derek Falvey. “But it doesn’t change our process, necessarily. Had (Cleveland) gone in a different direction and acquired two or three different players, would that have changed our process? I can’t say it would. I would say our view was, how do we best put this team in position to succeed this year and beyond?”
In other words, winning the AL Central in 2023 is important, but it can probably be accomplished without trading away any prospects who might help them win the division in 2024 or 2025.
https://theathletic.com/4792047/2023/08/21/al-central-worst-division-mlb/
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