This text is slowly touring by way of the Greatest 50. That’s my record of historical past’s 50 biggest ballclubs, as ranked by my new e book, Baseball’s Greatest (and Worst) Groups. At the moment’s story focuses on No. 47, the 1917 Chicago White Sox.
Right here’s a fast boilerplate rationalization that I’m appending to each story on this sequence:
I compiled the Greatest 50 by analyzing 2,544 major-league groups from 1903 to 2024. These golf equipment have been ranked by their crew scores (TS), that are plotted on a 100-point scale. (A given membership’s all-time percentile is the proportion of the opposite 2,543 groups that it outperformed.)
See my e book for an evidence of my TS calculations. The e book additionally presents separate breakdowns of the very best and worst golf equipment for each decade and franchise, complete profiles of the Greatest 50 (together with position-by-position lineups and way more info than you’ll discover on this publication), and related summaries of the ten worst groups of all time.
Now on to right this moment’s profile.
Staff: 1917 Chicago White Sox
Staff rating: 85.163 factors
All-time rank: 47 of two,544
All-time percentile: 98.19%
Season file: 100-54 (.649)
Season place: First place in American League
Ultimate standing: World champion
A pair of savvy acquisitions resurrected the Chicago White Sox, who hadn’t gained an American League pennant since 1906. Celebrity Eddie Collins was bought from the Philadelphia Athletics for $50,000 in December 1914. Joe Jackson, an outstanding hitter, arrived eight months later in a commerce with the Cleveland Indians.
The offensive spark supplied by Collins and Jackson propelled the White Sox to second place within the American League in 1916, solely two video games behind the pennant-winning Boston Crimson Sox. Chicago breezed to the AL championship in 1917 with a nine-game cushion.
The triumph was clouded by rumors that the Sox had engaged in subterfuge to pad their lead. A bunch of Chicago gamers, led by first baseman Chick Gandil, reportedly paid Detroit’s pitchers to ease off in a pair of doubleheaders on Labor Day weekend, and certainly, the Sox gained all 4 video games, romping to 34 runs within the course of. American League officers and White Sox executives selected to disregard the gossip.
Get the whole lowdown on the 50 biggest (and 10 weakest) golf equipment of all time
John McGraw’s New York Giants had certified for 3 World Collection earlier within the decade, solely to lose all three. The sad streak nagged at McGraw as he equipped for 1917’s sequence, although pundits doubted the Giants would lose once more. “I can’t see how they’ll be defeated,” wrote Sporting Information correspondent Joe Vila. “McGraw can have each man on the crew match to battle for his life.”
The White Sox confounded the specialists by taking the primary two video games. The Giants rallied with back-to-back shutouts to tie the sequence, then ran out of steam. The Sox rapped 14 hits in an 8-5 Recreation 5 victory and capitalized on three unearned runs in Recreation Six. Chicago’s 4-2 win clinched the title.
The jubilant 39-year-old supervisor of the White Sox, Pants Rowland, approached an apoplectic McGraw for a post-series handshake. “Get away from me, you busher,” McGraw snarled.
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The White Sox had been pleasantly stunned — even shocked — by Eddie Cicotte’s sudden emergence because the ace of their pitching workers. The 33-year-old knuckleballer had common a pedestrian 119-100 file in 10 earlier seasons, but he exploded to twenty-eight wins and an ERA of 1.53 in 1917, main the American League in each classes. Starters Lefty Williams, Crimson Faber, and Reb Russell mixed for one more 48 victories.
The membership’s two greatest hitters posted respectable stats, although every had motive to be upset. Left fielder Joe Jackson batted .301, the worst full-season common over his 13-year profession. Second baseman Eddie Collins hit .289, his first BA beneath .300 since 1908. The 2 stars had nearly nothing in widespread apart from their baseball abilities. Jackson was functionally illiterate. “It don’t take college stuff to assist a fella play ball,” he mentioned. Collins was an Ivy League graduate.
All eight gamers who mounted the 1919 World Collection — the notorious Black Sox — had been members of Chicago’s 1917 roster, together with 5 regulars within the infield and outfield. One of many future miscreants, heart fielder Blissful Felsch, led the ’17 Sox with a .308 common and 99 runs batted in.
Three of the Clear Sox — those that performed it straight in 1919 — would ultimately be enshrined within the Corridor of Fame: Collins, Faber, and Ray Schalk. The latter batted solely .226 in 1917, however he was agile and sturdy, maybe the very best defensive catcher of his period.
