I’m not so sure. They didn’t exactly have a difficult knockout stage, playing Denmark and the Czech Republic, and never scored more than a single goal in a game (in fact they only scored more than a single goal in a game once all tournament). They were lucky in that the only “good” teams they played were not exactly known for their defence.
But yes, I may also be coloured by the fact that I have never seen a more boring team do well in a tournament.
The Marlins.
2 World Championships and have yet to win their division.
The 1997 Marlins are a weird team in that they were loaded with quality players - Moises ALou, Garry Sheffield, Devon White, Kevin Brown, Edgar Renteria, Bobby Bonilla, Alex Fernandez, Al Leiter, all having seasons pretty typical of their ability. But then Jeff Loria completely disassembled the team so we will never know how that core would have done defending their championship. It’s hard to say how good or bad that team was. They did go 92-70, hardly bad for a World Series winner, and their 92 wins were not especially lucky.
The 2003 team is weaker, in my opinion. Not as weak as the 1987 Twins though.
:dubious:
Denmark and the Czech Republic, i.e the winner and runner-up in 1992 and 1996 respectively?
The 1997 Marlins were owned by Wayne Huizenga, though he did clean house after winning the championship. Loria would not become owner until 2003, under some kind of shady circumstances having previously owned the Expos and selling them to MLB.
I do not remember the 1987 Twins, but that looks like a strong candidate. They had the 5th best record in the AL, but won the West division.
NBA maybe the 1968-69 Boston Celtics with an aging roster, won only 48 games, tied for fifth best record out of a 14 team league, finished fourth in the east but won the championship. With the controversial decision by Laker coach Butch van Breda Kolff to keep Wilt Chamberlain on the bench the last five minutes (Chamberlain hurt his knee with 5 minutes left but with two minutes remaining and the Lakers trailing by a point was ready to come back in). Both Russell and Jones retired after the season.
You are all wrong. It happened in Australia - in 1916.
VFL - Victorian Football League (playing Australian Rules Football). Semi-professional.
Over the regular season, Fitzroy finished dead last (winning exactly 2 of their 12 games)…
HOWEVER, because it was wartime (WWI), only 4 teams were entered and played that season.
The playoff system used at the time meant the Top 4 teams made the playoffs.
You work out the rest, and guess what happened…
Was that the team where Kent Hrbek pulled the guy off first base and got the out?
There were also the World Series winners during the WWII years when all the teams were pretty crappy because the real major-league players were off fighting the war along with all the other healthy men in their age bracket. But they’re a special case.
That didn’t sound right, so I looked it up. In 1987, teams averaged 4.72 runs per game, the highest average between 1950 and 1994.
1988 was the low scoring year; I was making reference to the Dodgers, that’s why I mentioned Kirk Gibson in that sentence.
Hah, my bad. I remember 1987 as being a batters happy year. That’s quite the drop off from '87 to '88, and looking at the numbers, I’m surprised the MVP voters didn’t go for Strawberry’s traditionally sexy stat line of 39 HR/101 RBI.
At the time it was suggested that voters put a lot of stock in Strawberry’s low number in “late and close” situational statistics. Strawberry’s teammate Keith Hernandez apparently told writers that Kevin McReynolds was more valuable, leading Strawberry to take a swing at Hernandez in spring training in 1989, telling Gary Carter that he was next
In fairness, Hernandez was probably so high on coke that he didn’t know what he was talking about. Hernandez is an awful human being and why he’s largely gotten a pass for it I don’t understand.
It is interesting to note that even if they split the Met vote I don’t think either Strawberry or McReynolds would have beaten Gibson had there been an effort to give one guy’s votes to the other. Gibson got a majority of the first place votes anyway.