Chicago White Sox make announcement apologizing for their horrible season

The owner of the Chicago White Sox, Jerry Reinsdorf, surely didn't beat around the bush when describing his team's historically terrible performance this season, referring to it as "embarrassing" and a "failure," while fully accepting blame for what will indeed go down as a disappointing result. Reinsdorf's candid comments were made public in a letter to fans prepared for the final game of the season. By then, the White Sox had long since set the dubious record of a 40-121 mark, the worst by any major league team since the year 1900.

The White Sox salvaged the last game of their disastrous season, beating the playoff-bound Detroit Tigers 9-5 to finish off a 41-121 campaign. But the victory made Chicago, ironically enough, take the record from the 1962 New York Mets, a team that went 40-120 in its inaugural season, out of the record books. The Mets were somewhat forgivable since they were a new franchise, but this White Sox collapse was from a team with far more established history. Only the 1899 Cleveland Spiders, who posted an incredible 20-134 mark, had a worse overall season.

With Grifol let go in August, it was the interim manager, Grady Sizemore, who took over the reins during this stormy period. Under Sizemore, the White Sox recorded a 13-32 record, showing an improvement but still showing the struggles the team has been facing.

Still proud, though, he remained happy of how the team ended up finishing out the season, going 8-6 over its last fourteen games, including five wins in their final six games, so there was at least a small silver lining to this forgettable year. One of the most impressive parts of the White Sox's final push was how they fared against the surging Tigers. Chicago took two out of three against Detroit, a series that had huge playoff implications, with the latter two losses ultimately costing Detroit the second American League wild card and dropping them into a worse playoff draw against the Houston Astros instead of the Baltimore Orioles.

The historic lowlights of the White Sox season, in the end, will be remembered, but it isn't all bad news looking ahead. With this late surge in the team led by Sizemore himself, there are talks about his future being the permanent manager of the team. The 2024 season was a complete failure on all levels, but the attention turns to rebuilding and learning from lessons this year provided.