This World Series Will Make History No Matter Who Wins
The Milwaukee Brewers swept the two-time defending champion Dodgers to reach their first World Series since 1982, and they've never won a title in 57 seasons.
This year's World Series is going to make history. And it doesn't matter who wins.
Because every team still in it has been waiting a very, very long time.
Let's break it down.
The Brewers
Start with the Milwaukee Brewers. On October 15, they finished a sweep of the Dodgers, the two-time defending champions.
And they did it the hard way. In the last game, they were down four to nothing, and came back to win six to four.
It's the Brewers' first trip to the World Series since 1982. That's forty-four years.
They lost that one in seven games, to the St. Louis Cardinals.
And here's the big one. The Brewers have never won a World Series. Not once.
The team started back in 1969, as the Seattle Pilots. After just one season, they moved to Milwaukee. Fifty-seven seasons, and zero titles.
This year, they won a hundred and three games, the most in baseball. This might finally be the year.
The Longest Droughts Ever
So how long is too long? Well, the record belongs to the Chicago Cubs.
The Cubs won the World Series in 1908. Then they didn't win it again for a hundred and eight years.
Legend says it was a curse. In 1945, a fan was supposedly asked to leave a World Series game because he brought his pet goat, and he cursed the team.
The curse finally broke in 2016, when the Cubs won game seven against Cleveland. The longest title drought in North American sports, over.
The Boston Red Sox waited from 1918 to 2004. Fans blamed the Curse of the Bambino, after the team sold Babe Ruth to the Yankees.
And the Chicago White Sox waited from 1917 all the way to 2005.
The Other Side
Now, who will the Brewers play? It's coming down to two teams, the Cleveland Guardians and the Tampa Bay Rays. And both have their own long wait.
Cleveland last won the World Series in 1948. That's the longest active drought in all of baseball.
They've come close since. They lost the World Series in 1995, 1997, and that famous 2016 game seven against the Cubs.
Tampa Bay is younger. The Rays started in 1998, and they've been to the World Series twice, in 2008 and 2020. They lost both times.
They have never won a title either.
History Either Way
So here's why this World Series makes history, no matter what.
If the Rays get in, it's two teams that have never won a championship. Baseball gets a brand new champion, guaranteed.
If the Guardians get in, it's a team that's never won, against the longest active drought in the sport. Either Milwaukee finally wins its first title, or Cleveland ends a wait of more than seventy-five years.
Either way, one very long story finally gets its ending.
Game one is October 23, in Milwaukee. Who are you rooting for?
