The Oakland A’s almost made history in 1994. However, the player’s strike ended the season and eliminated the playoffs, sparing the A’s the ignominy of reaching the postseason that year.
The 1994 season is forever ingrained as one of the darkest moments in major league history. For the first time since 1904, the World Series was not played, one of the major casualties of the disastrous player’s strike. The Expos, who had the best team in the game, never recovered, relocating to Washington DC a decade later. Matt Williams could have been the single season home run leader, and Tony Gwynn may have been the last batter to hit .400.
For the Oakland A’s, that season was expected to be a lost cause. Their vaunted pitching staff from the start of the decade was in shambles, missing their key pieces. Mark McGwire was a shell of himself, his career seemingly ruined by injuries. After posting a 68-94 record in 1993, falling from the penthouse of the AL West in 1992 to the basement, little was expected in 1994.
And that was the end result in the 1994 campaign. McGwire was injured again. The pitching staff was a disaster, outside of the random career season of journeyman Steve Ontiveros. The A’s posted a 51-63 record, sitting 12 games under .500. Theoretically, they should never have even sniffed a playoff spot at the end of the season.
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Instead, the entire division was a trainwreck that year. In the first year of the four team AL West, none of the teams finished above .500. The Rangers “won” the division that year, with a 52-62 record. The last place Angels, despite a 47-68 record, were just 5.5 games out of first.
With the 1994 season being the first with three divisions, and theoretically the first with a Wild Card for the postseason, one of those teams would have reached the playoffs. Unless either the Rangers or the A’s went on a hot streak, the team that finished first in the division would have been the first, and thus far the only team to sneak into the playoffs with a record below .500.
That does not mean that whichever team won the West would have automatically been destroyed in the postseason. The 1973 Mets were just three games over .500 and reached the World Series. The same type of record applied to the 2008 Cardinals (83-78) and the 1987 Twins (85-77, but outscored by 20 runs), both of which won the World Series. Could the same have been the case for the A’s? Unfortunately, we will never know.
However, that uncertainty did potentially save the Oakland A’s one of less than glorious result – being the first team in MLB history to reach the postseason with a losing record.