Robin Yount will throw out the ceremonial first pitch before Game 1 of the World Series on Friday night in Milwaukee. The last time the Brewers played in the Fall Classic, in 1982, the Hall of Famer was their star shortstop. They lost Game 7 in St. Louis.
Forty-four years later, Milwaukee gets another chance to celebrate and possibly forever remove the Brewers from a list that nobody in baseball wants to be a part of. The Brewers are facing off against the Tampa Bay Rays, another of those teams that have never won a World Series championship. It's the first World Series between franchises that are vying for their first title since 1980 when the Philadelphia Phillies and Kansas City Royals faced off.
Five MLB franchises have never won a World Series,
but by Halloween it will be an exclusive group of four. So who's closest? Here's how the five rank, from furthest to the closest to a first championship:
Colorado Rockies
The Rockies have something to build on. Colorado scored 752 runs – its most since 2019 – and ranked in the top seven in MLB in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging.
But their pitching has always been the issue. The staff finished last in baseball with a 6.28 ERA, and the Rockies went 58-104 for their fourth consecutive season with at least 100 loses.
Paul DePodesta, heading into his first full offseason as president of baseball operations, says the club will act early to find starting pitching. That's if he can find pitchers willing to pitch at that altitude. The franchise's only World Series trip ended in a sweep by the Boston Red Sox in 2007, and any route back goes through the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres in that National League West.
Seattle Mariners
A year ago, Seattle was just outs from reaching its first World Series before George Springer's three-run homer in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series sent Toronto instead. The Mariners entered 2026 with the best World Series odds in the AL, according to FanGraphs. They finished 76-86.
Nearly everything broke bad for them. Brendan Donovan missed 84 games with a groin strain. Relievers Matt Brash, Cooper Criswell and Carlos Vargas missed 311 games combined. Julio Rodriguez hit .250 with a .718 OPS – both career lows. Cal Raleigh was batting .156 in August. They fired manager Dan Wilson at the end of the season.
The good news for them is that the Astros won the division with a .500 record, so the lane is open for them to get back into position.
San Diego Padres
The Padres won 91 games and made the playoffs for the third consecutive year – a first for the franchise. In the eighth inning of Game 4 of the National League Division Series in Milwaukee, Manny Machado drove a ball 406 feet. Garrett Mitchell caught it at the wall, and San Diego went home.
Machado is 34. He just posted a .711 OPS, the lowest of his career, and he's owed more than $39 million a year through 2033. Xander Bogaerts, also 34, hit for a .676 OPS and is signed through 2033, too.
Most of the rotation is about to hit free agency. New owners Kwanza Jones and Jose E. Feliciano paid $3.9 billion for the team this year, and nobody knows yet how much they'll spend to keep the Padres at the top.
Fernando Tatis Jr., 27, and Jackson Merrill, 23, give manager Craig Stammen something to work with. San Diego has been to two World Series. It lost to Detroit in five games in 1984 and got swept by the Yankees in 1998.
Tampa Bay Rays
Junior Caminero hit 42 homers this season. He is just 23 years old.
The Rays won 98 games and the American League pennant with a $95.6 million payroll – ranked 28th in baseball. Their starters have a 1.98 ERA this postseason, best among the 12 playoff teams. Their hitters struck out just 18.8% of the time in the regular season, the lowest rate in MLB.
Contact hitting now meets Jacob Misiorowski, whose fastball averaged 100.6 mph this season. Tampa Bay ranked 29th in OPS against pitches 98 mph or faster.
A loss would be their third in a World Series in 18 years, and ALCS MVP Freddy Peralta can be a free agent this winter. But Caminero is back and Kevin Cash, the longest-tenured manager in baseball with his current club, just keeps getting the Rays back to October.
Milwaukee Brewers
Last October the Dodgers swept the Brewers in the NLCS. This October, Milwaukee returned the favor.
The Brewers won 103 games – a franchise record and the most in baseball this season – and they're the favorites to win this series. Their best players are kids. Misiorowski, 24, led the majors with a 1.80 ERA and 252 strikeouts. Jackson Churios is 22. Shortstop Cooper Pratt made his debut this June.
Pat Murphy has won NL Manager of the Year twice in a row, and Milwaukee has made the playoffs in eight of the last nine seasons. Losing this World Series would hurt a franchise that has waited 57 years.
But it wouldn't knock the Brewers off this spot as most the likely to win a World Series of the five franchises that have never won one.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Ranking the five MLB teams that have never won a World Series: Who's next?
