Indians & Dodgers Streaks: CLE wins 19, LA loses 11

[jserraglio]

Update: Make that a 19-game winning steak for the Indians, equalling the 1947 DiMaggio Yankees's streak of 19; and 11 losses now for the Dodgers.

I am not getting too excited though. As the NYT article points out, what goes up in baseball inevitably comes down. And in the current stripped-down White Sox and Tigers the Indians were facing Triple-A caliber competition. Still, the Tigers are a proud franchise and the Indians will have their hands full tonight as they try to equal the modern record, the 2002 Moneyball A's streak of 20 in a row.

New York Times

Baseball is an up-and-down game. You win one, and, well, you’ll probably lose one tomorrow or the next day.

Not this season. The Indians are currently riding an 18-game winning streak, one of the longest in history. And the Dodgers, who put together several long winning streaks of their own this season, have somehow lost 10 in a row.

How historic the Indians’ streak is, partly depends on definitions. Several of the longer streaks in baseball history took place in the 19th century, when the rules were drastically different. Some included ties, which used to be common in the days before illuminated stadiums.

Throw those asterisked streaks out, and the Indians are tied for the fourth-longest pure winning streak ever in the majors. And they are close to taking the top spot.

The greatest streak by these criteria came in 1935, when the Cubs won 21 games in a row. In second place is the 20-game streak by the A’s that was immortalized in the movie “Moneyball.” And in 1947, the Yankees won 19 in a row.

Then come the Indians, who won their 18th straight on Sunday and face the Tigers on Monday night. They could match the Cubs on Wednesday and break the mark on Thursday against the Royals. Their streak shatters the previous club record of 13.

And then there are the Dodgers. On the morning of Sept. 2, the team was 92-41, by far the best record in baseball, and on pace to win a stunning 112 games on the year. In June they won 10 in a row, and in July they had streaks of 11 and 9.

Yet now they are riding a 10-game losing streak. The mystifying run includes close losses (6-5 on a walkoff against the Padres to start the streak) and blowouts (13-0 to the Diamondbacks, and 9-1 to the Rockies).

Things are even worse than that, because the Dodgers have lost 15 of 16, the sole exception a 1-0 win by Clayton Kershaw over the Padres.

The Dodgers are the first team in history to both win 15 of 16 games and lose 15 of 16 games in the same season, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

Math would tell you that the chance of .643 team, as the Dodgers are now, losing 10 in a row is about a third of 1 percent.

Despite their abysmal form, it’s too soon to give up on the Dodgers; they still have the best record in the majors, with the Nationals and red-hot Indians just behind. The Dodgers also remain the World Series favorite at bookmakers.

Yet if you’re looking for omens, no team has ever won the World Series with a 10-game losing streak, according to Elias. The record streak by a champion is nine by the 1953 Yankees.

But don't award the trophy to the streaking Indians either.

After the Cubs won their 21st straight in 1935, The Times wrote: “Hang up the warning signs in the Detroit jungleland. The rampaging Cubs are on their way with leveled sights that seem as if they can’t miss.”

The Tigers beat them in the World Series, four games to two.