Worst teams of 2011-2015
How bad were the Astros? So bad that they swept the bottom three slots
Nobody resented Jim Crane’s strong sense of satisfaction in October 2015. His plan had worked. The team he owned, the Houston Astros, had qualified for the playoffs for the first time in 10 years.
The Houston franchise that Crane purchased in 2011 was mired in mediocrity, posting a 76-86 record the year before. He gave the go-ahead for a youth movement. High-priced veterans were shown the door, replaced by a locker room of raw youngsters.
“I think we went under a lot of scrutiny when we took over and really kind of stripped the team down,” Crane said. “We made a lot of changes in the front office, too. I don’t know if it’s ever been done with that magnitude, but hopefully we’ve got a couple of believers now.”
They did, though most people in baseball had been skeptics prior to Houston’s playoff breakthrough. The Astros had been simply terrible in the early years of the half-decade between 2011 and 2015, the period that we’re examining today.
This is the 11th installment in my series of stories about the worst big-league ballclubs during the Modern Era, a period that dates back to 1961. I’ve been proceeding at five-year intervals on successive Mondays, arriving today at 2011-2015, a span in which Houston was clearly the most atrocious franchise.
The Astros suffered 106 losses in 2011, 107 in 2012, and 111 in 2013. The latter squad earned a team score (TS) of just 10.531 on a 100-point scale, the worst mark for any major-league club during the half-decade. The 2011 Astros were second-worst with a TS of 11.311, and Houston’s 2012 came next in these unhappy rankings at 13.628. Rounding out the list of 2011-2015’s five worst clubs: the 2011 Minnesota Twins and 2014 Texas Rangers.
Team scores are calculated by an equalized formula, which allows fair comparisons of clubs from different seasons. (Click here to learn about the TS formula.)
Scroll downward to see a list of the bottom 10 teams of the half-decade. Each is shown with its win-loss record and the percentage of Modern Era clubs that it outperformed. (A total of 1,656 big-league clubs played in the era.) Team scores and additional information are provided for the five squads that were the very worst.
If you’re curious about the previous rankings in this series, follow these links to see the lowest-rated teams from 1961-1965, 1966-1970, 1971-1975, 1976-1980, 1981-1985, 1986-1990, 1991-1995, 1996-2000, 2001-2005, and 2006-2010.
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1. Houston Astros (2013)
Record: 51-111
Team score: 10.531 points
Modern Era percentile: 0.8%
Manager: Bo Porter
Stars: Jose Altuve, a 23-year-old second baseman, batted .283 with 35 stolen bases. First baseman Chris Carter paced the club with 29 home runs and 82 runs batted in. Jordan Lyles led the starting rotation with a 7-9 record.
Bottom line: The Astros seemed to be regressing from 2011 onward: 106 losses, then 107, then 111. They finished 45 games out of first place in the American League West in 2013, and the playoffs seemed very far away. But a postseason berth was just two years on the horizon.
2. Houston Astros (2011)
Record: 56-106
Team score: 11.311 points
Modern Era percentile: 1.0%
Manager: Brad Mills
Stars: Right fielder Hunter Pence batted a solid .308 in 100 games, and left fielder Carlos Lee drove home 94 runs. Pence was traded in August 2011, Lee in the following season. Pitcher Wandy Rodriguez somehow put together a .500 record at 11-11. He would also be dealt in 2012.
Bottom line: The Astros fell into last place in the National League Central on April 5 and never left. Their worst spell was a 14-39 record in June and July, which left them with a miserable 35-73 mark at the beginning of August. They suffered another 33 losses the rest of the way.
3. Houston Astros (2012)
Record: 55-107
Team score: 13.628 points
Modern Era percentile: 1.6%
Manager: Brad Mills and Tony DeFrancesco
Stars: Jose Altuve led the Astros in runs scored (80), stolen bases (33), and batting average (.290) at age 22. Outfielder Justin Maxwell topped the club with 18 homers. Lucas Harrell anchored the pitching staff with an 11-11 record and an earned run average of 3.76.
Bottom line: This was Houston’s final season in the National League, and it went as badly as expected. The Astros wilted in midsummer. They went 3-24 in July, including a 12-game losing streak, and then posted a 5-22 record in August.
4. Minnesota Twins (2011)
Record: 63-99
Team score: 18.200 points
Modern Era percentile: 3.9%
Manager: Ron Gardenhire
Stars: Right fielder Michael Cuddyer hit a team-leading 20 homers. Injury-plagued catcher Joe Mauer batted .287 in 82 games. Center fielder Ben Revere stole 34 bases. Three pitchers topped the club with nine victories each: Brian Duensing, Francisco Liriano, and Carl Pavano.
Bottom line: The Twins sputtered to a 17-36 record over the first two months of the 2011 season, but then seemed to right themselves. They played 11 games above .500 in June and July, raising hopes for a strong finish. What followed instead was an atrocious 13-41 stretch in August and September.
5. Texas Rangers (2014)
Record: 67-95
Team score: 18.535 points
Modern Era percentile: 4.2%
Manager: Ron Washington and Tim Bogar
Stars: Third baseman Adrian Beltre won the Texas Triple Crown, leading the team with 19 homers, 77 RBIs, and a .324 batting average. Pitcher Yu Darvish went 10-7 with a sterling 3.06 ERA, and fellow starter Colby Lewis also won 10 games.
Bottom line: The Rangers had notched at least 90 wins in each of the four previous seasons, so 2014’s descent to a 67-95 record was totally unexpected. Texas remained above .500 until early June, when the wheels suddenly flew off in successive losing streaks of four, eight, six, and eight games.
Next five
6. Arizona Diamondbacks (2014), 64-98, 4.5%
7. Chicago Cubs (2012), 61-101, 4.8%
8. Miami Marlins (2013), 62-100, 4.9%
9. Philadelphia Phillies (2015), 63-99, 6.3%
10. Cleveland Indians (2012), 68-94, 6.6%