Narrative fail

 Ancient truism in the sportswriting biz, and the best comeback to every Joe Fan who ever declared, "You just hate (Joe Fan's team)!":

We don't root for the team. We root for the story.

Which brings us to the best story in baseball this season, until it wasn't.

That would be your Chicago White Sox, who made the postseason after losing 329 games across the previous three seasons, including a modern-day record 121 two summers ago. Last year they went 60-102.

This year: 84-78.

In other words, the 2026 White Sox would have finished an astounding 24 games ahead of the 2025 Pale Hose. So just making the playoffs was the baseball story of the year, and it's not even debatable.

And then ...

And then, the Sox wiped out Houston two straight in the best-of-three wild-card round.

And then ...

And then, they beat their nemesis, the Cleveland Guardians two straight in Cleveland in the ALDS to go back to Chicago needing just one more win in the best-of-five to advance to the ALCS.

And then ...

Ahem.

And then, the Guardians showed why they were the AL Central champs, and the White Sox were not.

They bombed the White Sox 9-3 in Game 3, then bombed them again, 9-5. Last night, back in front of the home crowd, they completed the comeback with a 2-0 win to send the best story in baseball home for the winter.

In those final three games, Cleveland outscored the Sox 20-8. 

That's what those of us in the biz call a "narrative fail." And not just any narrative fail, but a big-time narrative fail.

Ah, well.