It's rare for a defending World Series champion to win again — in fact, it hasn't happened in nearly 25 years.
But it's rare for a championship team to go on to have a sub-.500 season after winning, and that's exactly what the Texas Rangers are heading into with five weeks until their final game on Sept. 29 in Los Angeles.
The last defending World Series champions to finish under .500 in a season (excluding the COVID-shortened 2020 season) were the 2014 Boston Red Sox, who finished with a 71-91 record in 2015. The Washington Nationals finished eight games under .500 in 2020, when the pandemic-shortened season was shortened to 60 games.
The Kansas City Royals won the championship in 2015 and finished the 2016 season with an 81-81 record.
The 2023 World Series champion Rangers (59-69) would need to finish the season with a .500 winning percentage by going at least 22-12 over their final 34 games.
Including Friday's series opener against the Cleveland Guardians, the Rangers have played 15 games against teams with a .500 or higher winning percentage and 19 games against teams with a below .500 winning percentage, including seven games against the Seattle Mariners, who are also .500, seven games against the Los Angeles Angels (54-74) and six games against the Oakland Athletics (55-73).
The last team to win three consecutive World Series titles was the New York Yankees, who did so from 1998-2000.
Rangers manager Bruce Bochy won the World Series with the San Francisco Giants in 2010, 2012 and 2014, but failed to reach the playoffs in any of the following seasons. The 2015 team finished with an 84-78 record. The 2013 Giants finished 10 games below .500.
In the past 20 seasons, the only teams that struggled during their World Series defense were the 2007 St. Louis Cardinals (78-84) and the 2003 Los Angeles Angels (77-85).
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