Where did it all go wrong? A postmortem for MLB's 20 non-playoff teams

September is supposed to be the time when pennant chases really heat up, but for Diamondbacks fans, it was when they saw their seemingly robust postseason hopes go up in flames. Arizona started the month in first place in the NL West, only to suffer through a truly awful 6-17 stretch to not only lose the division lead but fall completely out of the playoff picture altogether. The main culprit? A pitching staff that saw its ERA balloon from the mid-threes for the season to over five in September.

Baltimore's season was over before it started. The club set its all-time record for losses this year with 115 and never even came close to anything resembling contention in the rugged AL East. The Orioles did not win more than nine games in any month, were 30 games under .500 against the rest of the division and simply offered little to no resistance to virtually every opponent. Baltimore's longest winning streak this season? Four games. On the bright side, it can't get worse for the Orioles next season — or can it?

The White Sox, like so many other teams on this list, never had a shot at contending. 2018 was going to be a rebuilding year from the start. The ChiSox managed to be nearly as bad as Baltimore, especially early on in the season. Unlike the Orioles, they managed a winning month, going 17-12 in August, something that saved them from the indignity of a 100-loss season. It also helped to keep them out of the cellar in the truly awful AL Central, a division that deserves some sort of recognition for collective futility (aside from Cleveland, of course).

Another team, another season that started with exactly zero expectation of making the playoffs, let alone having a winning year. And the Reds paid off that expectation by starting 7-22 in March and April and firing Bryan Price after only 18 games — during which the Reds went 3-15. Jim Riggleman has been more effective in Price's stead, going 63-77, but this is still another bad team that's trying to get even worse so that it can get better. The starting lineup has some legitimate punch, but as seems to always be the case in the Queen City, the pitching is abysmal. It would appear that a fifth straight 90-loss season is in the offing for 2019.

Getting tired of the rebuilding theme yet? The reason it was a story before the season around baseball is because it was true — arguably a full third of Major League Baseball was comprised of teams that weren't really trying to win with any degree of conviction. The Tigers were yet another example of this. To their credit, the Tigers hung in longer than just about every other 90-loss team, and when they won their fifth straight game on June 17, they sat a mere 2.5 games back of the first-place Indians. Then the bottom fell out. Detroit lost 11 in a row, and the AL Central race was functionally over.

Would you take back-to-back American League pennants and a World Series title, even if you knew it meant years of rebuilding immediately thereafter? The Royals were the AL's best in 2014 and 2015, leveled off to merely being average in 2016 and 2017 and blew everything up before this year started. Kansas City was 7-21 at the start of May, its fans already having endured separate nine- and five-game losing streaks in April. But hey, they still had the memory of a title relatively fresh in their minds, which probably helped. As a Pirates fan, I know I'd make that bargain.

Los Angeles' season functionally ended right around the beginning of July when it failed to do what Oakland managed — namely, get white hot at the right time and go on a tear that led them to the playoffs. The Angels' biggest issue was that, besides the otherworldly Mike Trout, they were a bad offensive club. Albert Pujols' late career spiral got even worse this season, and L.A. will have to deal with having Shohei Ohtani only as a hitter next year because of his impending Tommy John surgery. Trout staying great is predictable, Ohtani's next level of development is a mystery, and Pujols regaining his form of the mid-2000s would take a miracle. That's what the Angels need to contend.

The Marlins weren't trying to win this season, and their offseason moves included dealing Giancarlo Stanton, Christian Yelich and Marcell Ozuna to the Yankees, Brewers and Cardinals, respectively. Stanton, despite having a down year, still slugged 38 homers, Ozuna hit 23 despite scuffling at times in St. Louis, and Yelich may well win the NL MVP Award. Perhaps some of the names they got in return for these players may help Miami down the road, but in the here and now, bidding those stars farewell doomed the season months before it began. Don't worry though: Derek Jeter has this all figured out.

The Twins, like so many other teams, saw an awful losing streak functionally doom them before the calendar turned to May. In Minnesota's case, it was an eight-game slide that dropped them from first place on April 20 to 4.5 games back at the end of the day on April 27. Minnesota never really mounted any sort of serious challenge to the Cleveland Indians after that point. There were some solid enough offensive performances across the roster, but not nearly enough pitching in the Twin Cities. Moreover, it looks like 2018 will end up being hometown hero Joe Mauer's final season in the big leagues. If so, it's a shame it didn't go out with a bang.

The Mets were a shocking 17-9 at the end of April. They were 32-48 at the end of June. Methinks something went dramatically wrong in May and June. Namely, the Mets went 15-39, including a six-game losing streak to start May, a seven-game skid at the end of June and an eight-game run of losses that connected the two months. Despite Jacob deGrom's incredible season, the Mets were gutted by injuries, namely to Yoenis Cespedes, and even some positive play toward the end of the year wasn't enough to drum up any real optimism for the future in Queens.

The Phillies were 68-54 after beating the Mets on Aug.17. Then the bottom fell out in swift and spectacular fashion. Philadelphia went 12-28 over the season's last 40 games and moved from a team many felt would make the playoffs to one that didn't even finish above .500 on the season. Philly's pitching faltered badly in September, giving up 152 runs in 28 games, with the team going 8-20 in the month. Aaron Nola was great, but if the Phillies want to make a leap forward in the NL East, they'll need more help in the starting rotation. 

Where did it all go wrong for the Pirates? Look no further than July 31, the day they went way out of character and traded for Chris Archer, arguably the biggest name being shopped. Fans were ecstatic, but Archer was a flop in his first several starts, and the team endured a miserable 10-17 August that took them from right near the top of the wild card standings to also-ran status. A 16-10 September rally gave them an 82-79 mark to end the season, but that bad August plus a mid-May to mid-June swoon that erased a promising 26-17 start was enough to sink the Bucs.

The Padres were one of the truly bad teams on this list, but unlike some of the other dregs of the league, they were semi-competitive for almost half the season. After a win on June 15, they were 34-38, and at 6.5 out, were the only cellar-dweller within 10 games of first place in their division. Then they went 16-45 over their next 61 games to plummet to 50-83 on Aug. 26. Like so many other teams, both those that were trying to win and those that weren't, the Padres had the wheels come off during the dog days of summer. There weren't too many standouts on the mound or in the field for San Diego, so the future may still be a ways off.

San Fran gambled and lost in the offseason. They brought in Andrew McCutchen from the Pirates and Evan Longoria from the Rays, but they couldn't overcome an injury to Madison Bumgarner that robbed the ace of the first two months of his season. San Francisco was next to last in the NL with 133 home runs and simply couldn't adjust to baseball's trend back toward the long ball. The Giants managed to stay at .500 through August, but an MLB-worst 5-21 mark in September, including an 11-game losing streak to start the month, doomed them to an ugly 73-89 finish. 

One game above .500 on the final day of July and left for dead by most pundits, the Cardinals tore through August, posting a 22-6 mark and ending the month with the second-best record in the National League. September wasn't nearly as kind to St. Louis, as it went 12-15 for the month and was unable to finish strong enough to outlast Colorado and Los Angeles. The Cards peaked too early, especially their pitching, and a late sweep at the hands of the Brewers ultimately did them in. Anyone who watched St. Louis from Aug. 1 onward, however, knows that the Cards will likely be a force in 2019.

If you know anything about Pythagorean winning percentage, you know that the Mariners were due for a major regression. Seattle went 89-73 despite being outscored by 34 runs on the season. The Mariners were an extremely lucky baseball team, posting a 36-21 mark in one-run games. There was no astonishing, eye-popping losing streak that spelled the end for Seattle — just them gradually coming back down to earth. Oh, and playing in the same division as Oakland and Houston didn't help matters either. The Mariners a few nice building blocks on the field and a few intriguing pitchers, but they don't figure to seriously challenge Houston anytime soon. 

Tampa Bay's season was over as soon as it began, but through no fault of its own. How often does a team win 90 games and finish seven games out of the second wild-card position? I'll answer that for you — it has never happened. In the two-wild-card era, only two teams have won at least 90 games and not qualified for the playoffs. Texas won 91 games in 2013, but lost to Tampa Bay in a do-or-die Game 163, and Tampa missed out both this year and in 2012 despite having 90 wins both times. The Rays employed a radical pitching strategy, with great success, and won more games than their talent suggested they had any right to. Still, they'll be sitting at home in October. Blame the Red Sox, Yankees and Athletics, I guess.

Texas was garden-variety bad through May, rallied briefly in June then completely fell out of the race thanks to an 8-17 July. It was the same old story for the Rangers — decent offense with solid power numbers and truly awful starting pitching. Texas ranked at or near the bottom of the American League in just about every meaningful pitching statistic and wasn't able to overcome those deficiencies with the long ball. As always, if the Rangers are going to contend, they're going to have to find ways to hold the fort on the mound and rely on home runs to carry them. 

The Blue Jays started a gaudy 13-6, but a 13-29 swoon immediately thereafter took them out of the running in the brutal AL East. Power wasn't the issue in Toronto, which isn't surprising. The pitching left much to be desired, however, and the Jays didn't have a single starting pitcher make 30 starts this season. That's not a recipe for success, particularly in a division where two teams won 100 games and another won 90. Toronto's starting lineup is fairly long in the tooth, so the Jays will have to reload and figure out a way to climb back up to Boston's and New York's levels. 

Oh, the Nationals. Every year, they have incredibly high expectations. Just about every year, they fail to meet those expectations. 2018 was no different. The Nats were shocked by the Mets early on and then righted themselves, only to fall victim to the rise of the Braves and Phillies. A brutal stretch in the month leading up to the All-Star Game put them several games back of Philly and Atlanta, and they were powerless to stop the Braves when they opened up the throttle and put distance between themselves and the rest of the division. The Bryce Harper Era in Washington looks like it is over, and it will be one defined by disappointment.