{"id":226283,"date":"2025-10-20T00:36:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-20T00:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/226283\/"},"modified":"2025-10-20T00:36:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-20T00:36:09","slug":"oldest-teams-to-never-reach-a-championship-mlb-nba-nfl-nhl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/226283\/","title":{"rendered":"Oldest teams to never reach a championship: MLB, NBA, NFL, NHL"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/mlb\/story\/_\/id\/46639145\/2025-mlb-playoffs-post-nlcs-wpa-leaderboard-win-probability-added-shohei-ohtani-snell-sasaki\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">2025 MLB postseason<\/a>, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/mlb\/team\/_\/name\/sea\/seattle-mariners\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Seattle Mariners<\/a> are actively pursuing their first <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/mlb\/story\/_\/id\/41833734\/world-series-history-mlb-championship-winners-key-stats\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">World Series appearance<\/a>. Which other franchises across major sports leagues have yet to compete at the championship level?<\/p>\n<p>Check out a breakdown for MLB (World Series), NFL (Super Bowl), NBA (Finals), and NHL (Stanley Cup) below:<\/p>\n<p>Editor&#8217;s Picks<\/p>\n<p>2 Related<\/p>\n<p>Longest in each league (with inaugural season):<\/p>\n<p>MLB: Mariners (1977)<\/p>\n<p>NBA: Clippers (1970)<\/p>\n<p>NFL: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nfl\/team\/_\/name\/jax\/jacksonville-jaguars\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jaguars<\/a> (1995)<\/p>\n<p>NHL: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nhl\/team\/_\/name\/wpg\/winnipeg-jets\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jets<\/a> (1999-00)<\/p>\n<p>*On the NFL side, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nfl\/team\/_\/name\/cle\/cleveland-browns\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Cleveland Browns<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nfl\/team\/_\/name\/det\/detroit-lions\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Detroit Lions<\/a> are left off this list since both franchises won titles in the pre-Super Bowl era.<\/p>\n<p>**On the NHL side, the Arizona Coyotes (1979-80) technically have the longest Stanley Cup appearance drought, but don&#8217;t currently have a team in the NHL.<\/p>\n<p>Active teams to never compete in league championship round\/game (with inaugural season):<\/p>\n<p>MLB: Mariners (1977)<\/p>\n<p>NBA: Clippers (1970), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/cha\/charlotte-hornets\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Hornets<\/a> (1988-89), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/min\/minnesota-timberwolves\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Timberwolves<\/a> (1989-90), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/mem\/memphis-grizzlies\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Grizzlies<\/a> (1995-96), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nba\/team\/_\/name\/no\/new-orleans-pelicans\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Pelicans<\/a> (2002-03)<\/p>\n<p>NFL: Jaguars (1995), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nfl\/team\/_\/name\/hou\/houston-texans\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Texans<\/a> (2002)<\/p>\n<p>NHL: Jets (1999-00), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nhl\/team\/_\/name\/cbj\/columbus-blue-jackets\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Blue Jackets<\/a> (2000-01), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nhl\/team\/_\/name\/min\/minnesota-wild\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Wild<\/a> (2000-01), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nhl\/team\/_\/name\/sea\/seattle-kraken\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kraken<\/a> (2021-22), <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com.au\/nhl\/team\/_\/name\/uta\/utah-mammoth\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Mammoth<\/a> (2024-25)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the 2025 MLB postseason, the Seattle Mariners are actively pursuing their first World Series appearance. Which other&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":226284,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-226283","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=226283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/226284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=226283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=226283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=226283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}