11,000 wins: A franchise standard for the Chicago Cubs

9 of 11

The Chicago Cubs 11,000th franchise victory is the second most of any team.

The Chicago Cubs did something this week that’s only been done once before in baseball history. The Los Angeles Dodgers are poised to do the same thing…perhaps as quickly as this weekend.

Chicago’s 9-3 victory Monday night over the Detroit Tigers was also the 11,000th in franchise history. Only one other major league franchise has won 11,000 major league games.

More from Call to the Pen

In earning that distinction, the Cubs beat the Los Angeles Dodgers to the punch, probably by less than a week. The Dodgers entered play Wednesday night with 10,996 franchise victories, meaning they could hit 11,000 as quickly as this coming Saturday when they meet the Texas Rangers at Arlington.

The Cubs entered the 2020 season needing just 18 victories to reach 11,000, and for a time looked as if they would accomplish the historical feat in the first 25 games or so. They were 13-3 after just 16 games.

Since then, however, the team has slumped, taking 18 more games to get the final five victories.

The Dodgers entered the season 26 victories short of 11,000, and they’ve already bagged 22. They play the Giants in San Francisco Wednesday and Thursday before opening a three-game series against the Rangers on Friday.

Winning 11,000 games indicates two things. First, the franchise has been at least moderately successful. Second and perhaps most importantly, it’s been around for a very long time. The Cubs were an original member of the National League, which was founded in 1876. That means they’ve been winning games for 144 seasons, something only one other franchise – the Atlanta Braves – can say.

Which are the winningest franchises in history? And which franchise leads the list? Here’s a hint: The leader has never played its home games in The Bronx. If that surprises all you Yankee fans and Yankee haters, keep in mind that National League teams had been winning games for as many as 27 seasons when the New York American League franchise was created in 1903.

Here’s the list of the 10 winningest franchise in MLB history.

Trailing behind the Chicago Cubs, the Boston Red Sox have 9,612 wins.

The Red Sox have been an American League power second only to the Yankees. Since the franchise’s creation as an original member of the American League in 1901, the team has won 14 pennants – only the Yankees have more – and nine World Series.

Boston won the first AL-NL World Series in 1903, defeating the Pittsburgh Pirates 5-3 in a best-of-nine format. Five of those nine World Wins wins were in the books by 1918, after which the franchise went through an 86-year drought that was only broken in 2004. Blame Babe Ruth; everybody in Boston does.

The franchise’s “golden” decade – the one that produced the most victories – came between 2001 and 2010. In that 10-season period, Boston teams never finished below .500, averaged 92.4 wins, made six post-season appearances, and won two World Series.

The Red Sox have enjoyed five other decades during which they averaged at least 81 victories, those being the 1910s (84.8), the 1940ss (86.6), the 1970s (89.1), the 1980s (82.6) and the 1990s (81.1).

The shortened 2020 schedule precipitated by COVID may deny them that opportunity for the present decade; they are on course to average about 80 wins per season.

Boston’s only truly horrid decade occurred in the 1920s, long enough ago for current fans to have no recollection. That’s a good thing. Between 1921 and 1930, the Red Sox averaged just 57.5 wins per season. They never reached first division status and occupied seventh or eighth place annually from 1922 through 1930.

Also behind the Chicago Cubs are the Philadelphia Phillies with 9,836 wins.

The Phillies, founded in 1883 as the Quakers, are by record the least successful of the “original eight” National League clubs. In its 137-season history, the franchise has made 14 playoff appearances – about one per decade — although that enumeration is unfair to recent generations.

Between 1883 and 1979, Phillies teams only reached post-season play twice; since 1980 they’ve done so a dozen times, including five straight between 2007 and 2011.

Not surprisingly, that decade between 2001 and 2010 that produced five consecutive post-season teams also marked the high point in franchise history. Philadelphia averaged 88.2 victories per season during that period, easily a franchise high.

The only other decade during which Phillies teams averaged more victories than defeats was the 1970s. Philadelphia averaged 83 wins per season between 1971 and 1980, including divisional titles in 1976, 1977 and 1978 and the franchise’s first World Series win in 1980.

The bad years were many. During the 1920s, the Phillies averaged just 55.6 wins per season, improving only to 57.9 through the 1930s. In that 20-season block, Philadelphia teams brought up the bottom of the National League standings 10 times and only once finished as high as fourth. That was in 1932 when the team enjoyed a 78-win season, its highest victory total between 1917 and 1949.

Inching closer to the Chicago Cubs are the New York Yankees with 10,394 wins.

Obviously the Yankees are penalized by the fact that they did not play until 1903, a point by which the Cubs franchise had already exceeded 1,740 victories.

The franchise is also hurt by the fact that for the first dozen seasons of the team’s existence, the Yankees were bad. Through 1915, New York only four times finished above .500 or reached the American League’s first division.

The 27 World Series titles are even more remarkable when you consider that all 27 were accomplished between 1923 and 2009, an 86-year period that translates to one championship every 3.2 seasons. The Yankees can claim 40 of the 88 American League pennants contested between 1921 and 2009, and 55 playoff appearances between 1921 and 2019.

Still, the challenge faced by the Yankees in moving up on the franchise wins list is formidable. As of this moment, the gap between the Yankees in eighth place and the team immediately above them is 158 games.

Since 2010, the Yankees have averaged 91.2 victories per season, the next team has averaged 88.0 victories. Picking up wins at the recent rate of 3.2 per season, it would still take New York a half-century to erase that 158-game gap.

(Photo by Jared Wickerham/Getty Images) /

In the same division as the Chicago Cubs, the Pittsburgh Pirates have 10,552 Wins.

The Pirates began to play in 1892 as the Alleghenies, an American Association franchise. At the time, the AA was recognized as a major league. The franchise joined the National League in 1887.

If you subtract the 236 games Pittsburgh won as an AA member – that’s not what baseball historians do, by the way – then their win total declines to 10,316.

This may come as a surprise to Pirate fans, but there was a time – several times, actually – when the Pirate presence struck fear in the hearts of NL competitors. Over the years, Pirates teams have won nine National League pennants and five World Series, although none since 1979.

It is a measure of the team’s destiny that the winningest manager in franchise history was Fred Clarke, who retired in 1915.

But if you go back to those glory days, it is possible to envision the Pirates running relative roughshod over baseball. Between 1901 and 1910, the Pirates averaged 94.5 victories – that in a 154-game season – and won four pennants.

Only one of those Pirate teams, in 1909, won a World Series, but then only one of them lost a World Series, either. The 1901 and 1902 Pittsburgh champions were the last of the pre-World Series era.

Pittsburgh teams also made headway during the 1960s and 1970s. Their 1960 World Series victory presaged two decades in which Pirate teams averaged 84.2 and 91.0 victories per season, qualifying for post-season play six times between 1970 and 1969.

Since 1979, success has been more rare. Pirate teams have not enjoyed a plus-.500 decade since the 1970s, probably coming closest when this decade concludes. Since 2011, Pittsburgh teams have averaged 74.2 wins with an overall record of 742-739.

Given the state of the 2020 Pirates, the chances of finishing this decade above .500 for the first time since the 1970s are looking slimmer virtually by the minute.

Also in the same division as the Chicago Cubs, the Cincinnati Reds have 10,610 wins.

The present Reds franchise officially traces its lineage back to the 1882 American Association team, although Cincinnati teams represented the city in the National League from 1876 through 1880.

Before the Reds were kicked out of that original NL lineup – for the crimes of wanting to sell beer, play Sunday games and undersell the competition – they won 125 games. If you add those wins – historians consider those earlier Cincy teams a different franchise – they would climb one additional rung up the standings.

The Reds jumped to the NL in 1890, and have been members ever since. Pennants, however, were rare. The first didn’t come until 1919, the second took two decades more.

There is, however, no question about the golden era of Reds baseball. It occurred during the 1960s and 1970s, approximately overlapping the career of baseball’s all-time hit leader, Pete Rose.

During the 1960s, the Reds averaged 89.5 wins per season. One of their two pennants came in 1961, three years before Rose’s arrival. But the was a key part of the 1970 championship, and from 1964 on Cincinnati only once finished outside the first division.

The 1970s were even better. The Reds averaged 94 victories, won the 1975 and 1976 World Series, made five playoff appearances and only once finished worse than second in the NL West.

Since then, the franchise has backslid to a point where it is poised to wrap up the worst decade in franchise history. The 2011-20 Reds are on pace to average just 70 wins per season, with only one divisional title, that in 2011. The Reds haven’t finished above fourth in the NL Central since 2013.

(Photo by Mark Cunningham/MLB Photos via Getty Images) /

The Atlanta Braves, a storied franchise like the Chicago Cubs, 10,713 wins.

Like the Cubs, the Braves can trace their history back to the founding of the National League in 1876. They represented Boston continuously through 1952, winning 5,118 games during the course of their residency.

In Milwaukee between 1953 and 1965, the Braves added 1,146 victories, plus the 1957 World Series title. It was the second of three in franchise history: they won in Boston in 1914 and in Atlanta in 1995.

In Atlanta, the Braves have added 4,449 victories.

The Braves have enjoyed two substantial eras of dominance: the very recent one and the very ancient one. Between their 1991 World Series appearance and today, Atlanta has collected 2,611 victories, one-quarter of the franchise total in just 20 percent of the seasons. That works out to 87 wins per year.

Five of Atlanta’s 17 pennants have come during that three-decade span, which has also encompassed 19 of the franchises’s 25 post-season appearances.

The other glory period occurred during great-grandpa’s day. During the decade of the 1890s, the Braves won five pennants and averaged 85.9 victories per season. That’s better than it sounds because schedules only lasted about 132 games in those days. Boston’s winning percentage for the decade was .621.

In fact by the start of the 1900 season, the Braves could already count 1,686 victories. 131 more than any other franchise.

The bad parts have been pretty much everything between 1900 and 1991. That was particularly the case for the long tenure in Boston. During the 1920s, the Braves averaged just 61.1 victories per season, only once winning more than 70 or finishing better than fifth. The 1930s were more of the same: 69.5 wins per season, only three seasons better than .500 and only two finishes as high as fourth.

The Milwaukee seasons brought improvement. Between 1953 and 1965, the Braves won the 1957 and 1958 pennants, lost in a playoff in 1959, and lost more than they won. The arrival of Hank Aaron virtually concurrent with the move probably had more to do with that good showing than the change of scenery.

Back in the same division as the Chicago Cubs, St. Louis Cardinals have 10,928 wins.

The Cardinals have been one of the most consistent of all franchises. Only once since 2000 has the team finished worse than third in the NL Central, winning 10 division titles, four pennants and two World Series since then. Only one of those seasons resulted in a sub-.500 record.

You can extend that level of consistency back virtually a century. Since the 1920s, the Cardinals have averaged 844.1 victories per decade – that’s 84.4 per season – never dropping below 78.3. So even when the Cards haven’t been as good, they haven’t really been what you’d consider bad. In fact over the course of the past century, a Cardinal team has finished last in its league or division only once, that in 1990.

Only the Yankees have more World Series wins than the Cardinals’ 11.

There was a franchise low period, but you have to reach far into the past to find it. Between 1892 – when the former American Association team affiliated with the National League – and 1919, Cardinals teams finished last seven times hit the first division just four times and enjoyed only five plus-.500 seasons.

In short, the Cardinals have for some time been picking up and maintaining the pace. It took the franchise 35 seasons to get to 2,000 wins. They only needed 21 to reach 4,000 in 1938, and have marked off the successive 2,000 win milestones at intervals of between 23 and 24 seasons, reaching 10,000 in 2006.

(Photo by Victor Decolongon/Getty Images) /

Trailing behind the Chicago Cubs, Los Angeles Dodgers have 10,996 wins.

You can almost mark the turnaround in Dodger fortunes to the hiring of one person, and it wasn’t Jackie Robinson.

In 1939, the Dodgers hired Leo Durocher as their manager. Within two years Durocher had his team in the World Series.

Prior to 1941, the Dodgers had won just six pennants in their 56 years of existence, none since 1920. Since 1941, the Dodgers have made 31 post-season appearances, winning 18 pennants and six World Series.

As was the case with the Cardinals, you can chart the steady and dramatic change in Dodger franchise fortunes by looking at the franchise’s move up the wins chart. It took Brooklyn until 1913 – the franchise’s 29th season – to get to 2,000 victories. The Dodgers needed 27 more years – until 1940 – to hit 4,000.

Since then the Dodgers have picked up the pace. They got to 6,000 wins in 1962, 22 years after reaching 4,000 and four years after transferring from Brooklyn to Los Angeles. The 8,000th win came in 1985, 23 years later, and LA reached 10,000 wins in 2009.

The Dodgers have had two things going for them: talent and stable leadership. For the 58-year period between 1939 and 1996, only four men managed the team: Durocher, Charley Dressen, Walt Alston and Tommy Lasorda. Turnover in the front office has been higher, but five men – Branch Rickey, Buzzie Bavasi, Al Campanis, Fred Claire and Ned Colletti – held the duty for 53 of the 72 seasons between 1942 and 2014.

(Photo by B51/Mark Brown/Getty Images) /

And now, the one and only Chicago Cubs, ranked 2nd with 11,000 wins.

The Chicago Cubs were so bad for so long that it may be hard to imagine them as the second winningest franchise of all time. This is, after all, a team that only had eight winning seasons during the 46-season period between 1947 and 1992…six of those successively between 1967 and 1972.

That’s an average of just 72.9 wins per season for that nearly half century block..

In truth, until recently the Cubs have been living off the glory accrued nearly a century ago. Founded in 1876, the franchise has 17 National League pennants including the first one. By the mid 1880s Chicago teams had won six of the 11 NL pennants. They had 1,000 wins by 1891, 87 more than any other franchise.

If anything, the first decade of the 20th Century was even better. Between 1901 and 1910, Cubs teams averaged 91.8 victories per season, topping 100 wins four times and winning four pennants plus two World Series. By then they counted 2,538 victories and their franchise margin over the second winningest team had been extended to 278.

Related Story. Chicago Cubs: Kyle Hendricks is a modern-day Maddux. light

Through the 1920s and 1930s, the Cubs maintained their franchise pre-eminence. By the end of World War II, though, the handwriting was on the wall. During a miserable 59-103 1966 season, they relinquished the all-time top spot for the first time, and they’ve since allowed the Dodgers to close in on them for second.

That competition for the number two slot has become more competitive in the past five seasons. Since 2015, the Cubs have averaged 94.2 wins, staying competitive with LA’s 97.0 average win total. Still, if LA picks up only three wins per season on Chicago, the Dodgers will replace the Cubs as No. 2 next year, if not this year.

To reach the 1-spot, the Chicago Cubs will have to surpass the San Francisco Giants, 11,180.

The Giants took until 1966 to catch the Cubs in franchise wins only because they got a late start. The franchise did not become part of MLB until 1883, by which point Chicago had a 332-win head start.

A succession of stars gradually reversed that deficit. Like the Cubs, the Giants were a force during the first decade of the 20th Century, winning two pennants and finishing second four times thanks to stars of the magnitude of Christy Mathewson and manager John McGraw.