There are lot of reasons the Chicago White Sox are closing in on losing 100 games before August is over.
The offense is terrible, the defense makes too many mistakes, allowing for extra outs, and the bullpen seems to find ways to blow leads. It also did not help that the White Sox won just three games in July and had an American League-tying 21-game consecutive losing streak this season.
The inability to come back and win is another reason the White Sox are on track to lose 124 games.
The Sox have 10 comeback victories. For context, the Los Angeles Angels have just as many comeback wins, 31, as the Sox have victories all season. The Angels are terrible this year.
Finding a way to rally back is a reason the Angels are just run-of-the-mill bad while the White Sox are threatening to overtake the 1962 New York Mets as the worst team ever in the 162-game era. Being able to come back is a big difference between at the top of the standings or sitting at the bottom.
The Milwaukee Brewers are at the top of the NL Central in part because they can come back from a deficit to win.
A note from my desk:
— Dominic Cotroneo (@Dom_Cotroneo) August 21, 2024
The Brewers have more comeback wins (33) than the White Sox have regular wins (31).
The same can be said for the Cleveland Guardians, who lead the league in comeback wins, and are at the top of the AL Central.
The Sox on the flip side have blown 47 leads and that is one reason why the Southsiders are over 40 games back of the Guardians in the standings.
Being talent-deficient is a huge reason the White Sox are on track to be the worst team in the 162-game season era. Also, these marginal issues like lack of comebacks is a reason the Sox are flirting with losing more than 120 games.
10 teams have 31 or more comeback wins. Two of those teams are not in the playoff race. It is not rallying is reserved for contenders. A bad team can still find ways to win if they do not have the lead after six innings.
The Washington Nationals have been rebuilding for a while and they have 32 rally wins. That is one more win than the Sox' entire victory total. The Rockies are awful this year and 27 of their 47 victories have come via rallying back.
Nearly half of the Marlins wins are via the comeback, including a few against the White Sox. That just shows the difference between being bad like the Marlins and Rockies are and embarrassingly bad like the Sox are right now.