It truly is a remarkable thing, this White Sox team.
As MLB pauses for the All-Star break, the Sox are 27-71, owners of the worst won-lost record in the game. At their current pace, they’re on track to finish 45-117, which would be only three losses fewer than the 1962 Mets, who went 40-120 for the most defeats in the history of modern baseball (since 1901).
Indeed, if the Sox were to pick up their pace of losing just a bit, they might break the Mets’ dubious record.
Now that is something. As late sportswriter Bill Gleason loved to say of such things, it is ‘‘singular.’’
The Sox are 32½ games behind the American League Central-leading Guardians and 36 behind the MLB-leading Phillies. They are so out of it that they could win 32 consecutive games while the Guardians lose 32 in a row and still be in second place in their division.
And the Mets should have an asterisk by their 40-120 record because that team had no idea what it was doing. As their manager, Casey Stengel, said: ‘‘They have shown me ways to lose I never knew existed.’’
Yes, the Sox have demonstrated a bit of the same. Mostly, however, it is the variety of their unpredictable losing, their ability to turn anything into disaster, that stands out. It’s as if before each game a magician spreads in his hand a 52-card deck of losing techniques and says to manager Pedro Grifol, ‘‘Pick one.’’
I don’t know how Grifol continues to explain the losing after being forced to do it 71 times in only 98 games this season. That he doesn’t just run, babbling, into the night is a testament to his ironclad stomach and rare brain-calming abilities.
‘‘This is not something we planned for,’’ he said after the Sox lost to the Pirates 9-4 in their final game before the break Sunday.
No, you guess you wouldn’t plan on a major-league-leading 23 blown saves from your bullpen or being 29th in the majors in batting average and 30th in walks allowed, on-base percentage and slugging percentage. Nor would you plan on having everybody under the sun injured. Indeed, seldom has there been a team that can injure so many of its own players simply by having them run to first base or chase a fly ball.
So many things have to go wrong for a team to set the all-time record for losses before the All-Star break that a look at the present is almost a false window into the problem. The mess took years to create. Go back to players who underproduced, unfortunate trades by former general manager Rick Hahn, a weak farm system, a lack of team chemistry, stupidity on the field, prospects who became duds, bad coaching, bad luck and injuries, injuries, injuries.
And don’t forget owner Jerry Reinsdorf, who somehow has let this franchise become so bad, so feeble and embarrassing, that you wonder whether he knows what is happening. If he is aware. If he cares.
The buck stops at the top. And, man, that buck has been crumpled into a ragged and dirty piece of paper that you wouldn’t trade for 50 cents.
And I’ll tell you this: I truly feel sad for the players on the Sox who don’t deserve to be part of this. There are a few, of course. And being on a team headed to infamy is a stain that won’t wash out, one you don’t want to carry for life.
Instead of being a proud major-leaguer, you become a punch line. Luis Robert Jr., the young center fielder with such great tools — and, of course, with such great injury prospects — might get saved from the descent by being traded before the deadline July 30. The same is true for star pitcher and lone Sox All-Star Garrett Crochet. If he and Robert are sent off, we’re talking about team with a real shot at being the worst in history.
It’s darkly humorous, this ineptitude. But it also makes you cringe and think about all the dumbness that got the Sox to this point. I’m reminded of another Stengel statement about his Mets: ‘‘You look up and down the bench, and you have to say to yourself: ‘Can’t anybody here play this game?’ ’’
