11 great players vying for their first ring

Many of our greatest baseball players have never won a World Series. Ted Williams never won one. Neither did Ken Griffey Jr., Ty Cobb, Tony Gwynn, Barry Bonds, Harmon Killebrew, Ernie Banks … Heck, while we’re here, Mike Trout hasn’t either. (You may have heard that he also has not won a postseason game.)

This is not quite as big a deal in baseball as it is in other sports. Dan Marino, Karl Malone, Randy Moss, Patrick Ewing, Charles Barkley … Never winning a title will be part of their biographies forever. But not winning a World Series isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Bonds or Williams. It’s a very different sport.

Still, you’d like to see the all-time greats get a World Series title. Half the fun of the Dodgers’ championship a couple of years ago revolved around Clayton Kershaw adding that final line to his Hall of Fame résumé; Freddie Freeman winning it all last year certainly felt like something we’ll be talking about when we discuss his Cooperstown case in a decade or so.

These are some of the greatest we’ve ever seen, and it just feels right for them to win a title before they retire.

Today we look at 11 active players who have had the best, most storied careers but have yet to win a World Series … and have a chance to do so this year. (That’s why you won’t find Trout here, poor guy.)

Some of these guys are sure-fire Hall of Famers, some are still trying to build a case, some aren’t particularly close but have been among the best in the game for years. They’re all stars who haven’t won one but are still in the race to do so this year. This could be their year to avoid the Marino Curse.

1. Jacob deGrom, RHP, Mets

There are many, many great players on this list, some of whom have a better chance of reaching Cooperstown than deGrom, who may have just missed too many games to make it. But are any of them as truly dominant when on their game -- as truly capable of winning a game entirely by themselves -- as deGrom? deGrom’s brilliance is difficult to overstate, but it has been seven years since we even saw him in a playoff game. deGrom can hit levels in the sport few have. A World Series would assure his place on the mountaintop and make his future Hall of Fame case a lot more compelling.

2/3. Paul Goldschmidt, 1B/Nolan Arenado, 3B, Cardinals

It's cheating a little bit to put these two together, but it does make sense, doesn’t it? Two players who spent years out West showcasing their incredible skills both offensively and defensively, the heart and soul of teams who never really got a chance to show off their skills on a national stage despite a fanbase that adored them in equal measure. (Neither ever so much as reached an NLCS while leading their previous franchises.) They both have also played at an MVP level over many years without ever winning one.

Now they’re having perhaps the best seasons of their long careers, for the same team, and at the same time, while being surrounded by future Hall of Famers Albert Pujols and Yadier Molina. But neither has had the true October moment that would make them go global. They’re both still putting together their Cooperstown cases, and a title would be the most sterling line on both their résumés … even if the other one ends up winning the MVP Award.

4. Bryce Harper, DH, Phillies

Bryce Harper was the best player on the Nationals for a long, long time, and for many years the primary reason that team was able to remain competitive at all. But that doesn’t change the fact that the Nationals won their first -- and only -- World Series the very next season after Harper left for Philadelphia as a free agent. Harper has been fantastic for Philly and appears set to return just in time for the stretch run, but Nationals fans will happily remind you how many more World Series titles they have without Harper than they do with him. It would behoove Harper to someday change that.

5/6. Giancarlo Stanton, DH/Aaron Judge, RF, Yankees

We are grouping these giant sluggers together for obvious reasons.

It remains to be seen whether injuries have ended any chance Stanton might have at Cooperstown, though he has won an MVP Award and will (probably) hit his 400th homer next season. But if there’s one way to justify the big trade the Yankees made for him a few years ago, it’ll be winning a World Series, and he made sure everybody knew that's what was most important to him when he came to town. Stanton has almost been lost in all the Judgemania the last few years, but he is still an all-timer of a power hitter. Getting a title would add a gravitas to his career that he could probably use.

• Aaron Judge home run pace tracker

As for Judge: You know what was particularly special about Roger Maris’ 1961 season? The Yankees won the World Series that year. Just saying.

7. Gerrit Cole, RHP, Yankees

Sticking with the Bronx theme, the Yankees brought in Cole to be the postseason shutdown ace they had been lacking since the Clemens/Mussina/Pettitte days, and he was just that in 2020; you can’t blame him for the Yankees losing to the Rays that year. But he struggled mightily in the Wild Card Game loss to the Red Sox last year, and although he’s been good for the Yankees this season (just like he has been since he arrived), it has been his “worst” year with the team, and he'll be lucky to receive as many Cy Young votes as he did the last few years. (And of course he'll be with New York through 2028.) He has the surly demeanor of a true postseason ace, though, and nothing would make him more immortal in the eyes of Yankees fans than winning Game 7 of a World Series. He will remain the man the team trusts the most to do just that.

8. Manny Machado, 3B, Padres

It doesn’t look like he’s going to get that long elusive MVP Award this year, but he’s still the most consistent player on a team with big championship ambitions and the one superstar on the team (after the suspension of Fernando Tatis Jr.) who hasn’t won one but still has a chance to. If Machado could lead the Padres to a championship without Tatis, it would burnish his legend in a way that winning one with him might not. It would be his title. As a player who is building a Cooperstown case year by year, it would be the one they’d remember him for.

9. Andrew McCutchen, Brewers

It has been quite a few years since McCutchen was a star -- since 2015, probably, two years after he won his MVP Award with the Pirates. (You wonder if someday he’ll return to the Pirates, Pujols-like, to receive the lauds he deserved for pulling that franchise back up from the muck in his day.) But he hasn’t been as valuable in any season since then as he has been this year, one of the most consistent offensive players on an inconsistent offensive team. He has been particularly strong over the last week or so, when the Brewers have been flailing. He’s a terrific presence both on and off the field, respected throughout the game, and he’s exactly the sort of unappreciated player who should someday get his moment in the sun.

10. José Ramírez, 3B, Guardians

Ramírez was hit-or-miss in his first three truncated seasons with Cleveland before exploding on the scene in 2016 and smashing the ball with regularity since then. He might have been Cleveland’s best hitter in the 2016 World Series, but he struggled in the 2017 and 2018 ALDS, both losses. His contract extension means he’ll be the centerpiece of the franchise throughout the rest of this decade, and, if you can believe it, he's already 16th in franchise history in career WAR (per Baseball Reference). If the Guardians are able to win their first World Series since 1948, he’ll be the perfect guy to be right there in the middle of it.

11. Francisco Lindor, SS, Mets

And we’ll close with one of Ramírez’s former teammates and bookend this list with another Met.

How many Mets fans will admit they booed Lindor right after he signed? It’s OK: It’s New York, we understand. More to the point: Lindor has shown everyone in Queens why he was so sought after, and so relentlessly likable, before he came to town. His numbers have been solid, but mostly he’s been at the centerpiece of a terrific team. Lindor is, more than anything else, a winning ballplayer: Winning the ultimate prize would be the ultimate proof of that.