Cruds alert!

 (And no, not my Pittsburgh Cruds, who are threatening to break the bonds of Crud-dom on account of their current behavior, which is playing weirdly like a real baseball team. Right now, on July 28, they're a game out of second place in the NL Central, and they have the scariest pitcher in baseball right now in rookie phenom Paul Skenes)

Now where was I?

Oh, yeah. Cruds.

Who this summer, of course, are the those sad barefoot ragamuffins, the Chicago What Sox (as in "What th-?"). The What Sox started out cruddy and then got cruddier, and now they have split the atom of Crudness to unlock the awesome power of the Crud Universe. Or, you know, some similarly tortured metaphor.

Seen what they're doing lately?

Yes, losing. That goes without saying.

Except now they are epically losing.

Going into today the What Sox have lost 13 straight baseball games, their longest losing streak of the season. They haven't won a game since July 10, when they beat the Twins 3-1 in the first game of a doubleheader. Prior to that, they'd lost three straight. 

Which means since July 6 they're 1-16. 

Which also means their season record now stands at 27-80, dead last in both baseball and the AL Central, where they're so deep in the bowels of the earth the Mariana Trench is suing for copyright infringement. As of this morning, they're 36 1/2 games behind front-running Cleveland, and 25 1/2 behind next-to-last Detroit.

Their 27 Ws, meanwhile, are 12 fewer than anyone else in the majors. Twelve.

In other words, the What Sox are your basic Beloit Sky Carp or Lansing Lugnuts (of the Class A Midwest League). Heck, the Sky Carp or Lugnuts might be better. 

I can't imagine what it must be like to be a What Sox fan these days, especially one who remembers Nellie Fox and Luis Aparicio and the Go-Go Sox and the 2006 World Series champs. I can't imagine what it must be like to be a certain former colleague who's the What Sox beat writer for the Chicago Tribune.

My heart goes out to them; two more months of this torture. My heart also goes out to the What Sox themselves.

Of course, being the What Sox, they'd probably drop it.

Sorry. Couldn't resist.