The Chicago White Sox avoided the sweep on Wednesday. They beat the Kansas City Royals to stay away from something pretty embarrassing. Being swept by one of the three teams with a worse record than them would have been so bad.
Now, the White Sox are headed to Detroit. If they don't finish the season with a certain record, they are going to finish with 100+ losses which is not a good look for a team that entered the season with expectations.
It became pretty clear early that the White Sox weren't going back to the playoffs pretty early in the year. Now, we are in September waiting for the season to end so Chris Getz can get his plan in motion.
Are the White Sox mathematically eliminated from the playoffs though? No. They are not. There is a 0% chance that they make it but they haven't been mathematically eliminated yet.
The Chicago White Sox are not mathematically eliminated just yet.
As they sit with their off-day right now, the elimination number (sometimes known as the tragic number) is four. Any four losses by the Sox or wins by the Minnesota Twins eliminate them. The Kansas City Royals are the only AL Central team eliminated from the division.
The White Sox are already eliminated from the Wild Card race along with the Kansas City Royals and Oakland A's. It is odd that they are still mathematically alive in the division but not in the Wild Card race.
That goes to show just how bad this division is. The Texas Rangers are below the Wild Card line but they would be leading the AL Central. That is baseball though.
It won't be long, however, before this tragic number reaches 0. It will probably be at that point before the weekend is over. It is a shame that this team is this bad but changes are coming as a result.