There are success stories to celebrate this season. The Boston Red Sox, Cleveland Guardians and Kansas City Royals' start to the season come to mind.

However, baseball is a sport of failure. Whether a hitter or a pitcher, everyone who plays the game has to confront failure at some point.

This ranking takes failure to another level, though. Here, we seek out the 10 biggest disasters three months into the season and rank them.

Disaster is measured primarily by performance, with some consideration to how it measures up with prior expectations. To that end, some players and teams are graded on different curves than others.

The bottom line is the same, though. These are the 10 biggest disasters just a few months into the MLB season.

10. Houston Astros

It's a credit to the Houston Astros that they could be one of the biggest disasters of the season and still be in the hunt for not only a postseason spot but also another AL West title.

Despite being two games under .500 going into Tuesday's action, they are just 5.5 games behind the Seattle Mariners for the division lead. They entered the day as the only AL team with both a positive run differential and a record below .500.

So, what's the disastrous part?

Well, their dreadful start and the pitching injuries they've been unable to avoid. The Astros are still recovering from going 12-24 in their first 36 games. They are 26-16 since May 9, but it's quite the uphill climb for Houston.

They have three starters recovering from Tommy John surgery, two of whom had the procedure in consecutive days earlier this month. That does not include 41-year-old Justin Verlander, who was recently placed on the 15-day injured list with neck discomfort.

The prospect they called up from Double-A to replace him, Jake Bloss, went 3.2 innings before he was pulled and ultimately placed on the injured list with right shoulder inflammation.

Houston is on this list because of the perennial high expectations and has been forced to rely on inexperienced pitchers while trying to stay out of its own way.

9. Toronto Blue Jays

You would never know by watching them play how much hype surrounded the Toronto Blue Jays.

They had young, exciting players such as Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette. They were also unafraid to spend big money on veteran free agents like George Springer.

However, it just has not materialized as Toronto's front office must have envisioned. Now, it's gone from making the postseason in 2022 and '23 to being the AL East's worst team in '24.

The Blue Jays are fourth-worst in runs scored, which is a shame considering they are fairly average at getting on base and creating runs.

Toronto holds the sixth-worst OPS with runners in scoring position, which explains a lot of its offensive shortcomings.

This is one of the biggest disasters because the Blue Jays were supposed to be building an offensive powerhouse in Toronto and then supplementing it in pitching. But the team is headed in the opposite direction of what would have been predicted in recent years.

8. Pennant Winners

Going to the World Series is hard enough. Sustaining that level of excellence is even more difficult.

Look no further than last year's pennant winners. The Arizona Diamondbacks and Texas Rangers are both struggling to play .500 baseball just a season removed from participating in the Fall Classic, which the Rangers won in five games.

Texas is not slugging the way it did last year. It finished the season ranked third in slugging with the best mark in the AL. Now, it's in the bottom third of baseball.

Last season, the Rangers ranked fourth in wRC+. Now, they rank 24th. Starting pitching for Texas has been OK, even with Max Scherzer only just making his season debut on Sunday. Its bullpen ERA, however, is one of the five worst in baseball. It hasn't been able to take advantage of Houston's slow start.

Then there's Arizona, holding the fifth-highest ERA and FIP. It's striking out the second-fewest batters per nine innings, only ahead of the Colorado Rockies.

The Diamondbacks' pitching wasn't exactly great last regular season, a decidedly mediocre campaign for the NL pennant winners. But this season it's been disastrous to the point of negating a decent hitting team.

Postseason hero Corbin Carroll has a shocking 0.2 WAR next to his name. Arizona won't be going anywhere until his bat wakes up.

7. Miami Marlins

The Miami Marlins are one of only two teams with a negative fWAR on the season. They are also the second-worst at creating and scoring runs. It's because they can't get on base. They can't slug.

Just two teams have a worse record or run differential.

It is a remarkable turn for a squad that is just one season removed from making the postseason as a wild card.

Any hope or anticipation they might build on such a performance is out the window. The Marlins are already viewing themselves as early sellers, well ahead of the MLB trade deadline, according to Patrick Mooney and Will Sammon of The Athletic.

They seemed to telegraph that the organization was headed in this direction when they didn't bring back Jorge Soler, Skip Schumacher declined his 2025 option, and Luis Arraez was traded to the San Diego Padres in early May.

It's still striking to see how bad they are. Their calling card was supposed to be pitching, and that's failed them, too. Miami holds the fourth-highest WHIP and ERA.

Hope isn't on the horizon, either. The Marlins farm system is ranked 25th in the latest rankings from B/R's Joel Reuter.

6. Brayan Bello, Boston Red Sox

It is an odd conundrum for Boston because its pitching staff has been one of the surprises across the sport this season.

Except Brayan Bello, who signed a six-year, $55 million extension this offseason but has seemingly regressed.

The 25-year-old was once considered the only potential bright spot in Boston's rotation going into the season. Now, he's the weak link.

Bello has the highest ERA (4.83) of any Red Sox pitcher with more than one start. His pitching run value is well below average, while it had been closer to average in his previous two seasons.

His offspeed run value has taken the most noticeable dip, going from the 95th percentile last season to the 29th percentile.

It would be even more of a disaster if his teammates didn't pick him up and help the Red Sox establish themselves as true wild-card contenders.

Bello's recent start was encouraging, but that was against an underachieving Blue Jays squad. He is still expected to be part of Boston's future, but he has to get out of this funk. The Red Sox playoff hopes may depend on it.

5. Corbin Carroll, Arizona Diamondbacks

It has not been a smooth season for the reigning NL Rookie of the Year who was an All-Star for Arizona last season.

Just three weeks ago, Corbin Carroll watched his average dip to .192, and he's only slashing .167/.375/.333 over his last seven games.

There was a 12-game stretch this month when he hit .340/.446/.511, but that's a small sample size in a larger, more disappointing body of work in 2024. His numbers are significantly down from his rookie season across the board.

For comparison, Carroll slashed .285/.362/.506 for a .868 OPS with 25 home runs last season. He's slashing .211/.305/.313 for a .618 OPS with only two home runs this year.

The 23-year-old probably deserves some grace for the sophomore slump, and maybe he's a prisoner of his own success. But given the expectation he set last season, the first three months of this one have been disastrous.

4. Kris Bryant, Colorado Rockies

Kris Bryant spends more time on the injured list than he does in the Rockies' lineup. But even when he's played, it hasn't been very good.

Through 86 at-bats in just 24 games, the 32-year-old is slashing .186/.307/.279 for a .586 OPS with two home runs. He hasn't even played enough to qualify in most statistics, and he's not hitting the ball hard like he did as an NL MVP way back in 2016.

In 2022, the Rockies invested $182 million over seven years on Bryant, who was coming off his fourth All-Star appearance after splitting time between the Chicago Cubs and San Francisco Giants. He performed in limited action that year with a .306/.376/.475 slash line. But a back injury held him to just 42 games and multiple IL stints.

The numbers have gone down significantly ever since. He is back on the injured list for a second time this season. He missed 31 games with a low back strain and has been out since early June with a rib cage injury.

Given the Rockies have the second-worst record in baseball and are paying Bryant to be a difference-maker, this one has disaster written all over it. For 2024 and through the rest of his contract.

3. Spencer Torkelson, Detroit Tigers

There are high hopes for the Tigers' former No. 1 overall pick from 2020. For now, all the Detroit fans can do is hope, because he's done little or nothing to support it.

The 24-year-old has been so bad on a Tigers team below .500 and headed nowhere that they sent him down to Triple-A to work things out.

Through 209 at-bats this season, Torkelson is slashing .201/.266/.330 for a .596 OPS. His expected batting average (.192) and slugging (.325) are even worse, putting him in the bottom five percent of baseball. Even his defense at first base is subpar.

His best numbers are against the breaking ball, but he's struggling mightily against offspeed (.074 batting average) and fastball pitches (.181 batting average).

It's too early to call the 24-year-old a bust since there is plenty of time to work on his game. But so far, he is disastrous, for sure.

2. Blake Snell, San Francisco Giants

So much for the Giants stealing away the two-time Cy Young Award winner from their division foe San Diego Padres.

Blake Snell has not come close to living up to expectations since arriving in San Francisco shortly before the season started. He is rehabbing in Triple-A from a groin strain suffered earlier this month.

But the 31-year-old could not even make it out of the second inning Sunday after 51 pitches.

Snell told reporters after the game that he didn't want to make excuses for his poor performance but was frustrated.

He has made just six starts for San Francisco and is 0-3 with a 9.51 ERA. His pitching run value is poor, in stark contrast to last season when nearly all of his advanced numbers were exceptional.

The Giants aren't very good, but it does beg the question of how much further along they would be if the ace they paid for was actually healthy and pitching like one.

1. Chicago White Sox

There is no bigger disaster in baseball than what's happening on Chicago's South Side this season.

The White Sox can't hit. They can't pitch unless it's Garrett Crochet or Erick Fedde. Those are two of the few redeeming qualities of this team. Both are likely to be on other teams come August.

Otherwise, they rank last in every relevant offensive statistic. No one is worse at creating runs (77 wRC+), or scoring them. The White Sox are the worst in all three slash line categories. So it should surprise no one that their -2.7 fWAR easily ranks as the lowest in baseball.

On the pitching side, only the Colorado Rockies (a perpetual disaster) have a higher ERA. The Rockies and Los Angeles Angels have a worse FIP, but the White Sox are behind everyone else in that category as well.

This is a disaster because it's nearly impossible to point to what the White Sox do well. They were expected to take a step back, but becoming one of the worst teams ever was not exactly on the radar.

This could end up being a historic season for the White Sox for all the wrong reasons.