Worst Captain in Star Trek

[Starflight]

There probably actually is an amusing argument to be made that Kirk is uniquely bad as a captain if TOS is taken literally rather than in the mythic/theatrical spirit in which it's intended. Loses a crewmember every five seconds then laughs about it, almost loses the ship every other week, loses a communicator on a pre-warp planet and brushes it off with a joke...

Then again, Tracey still wins. Truly unbelievable man, there is simply nobody like him.

 

[XCV330]

Actually, the survival rate under Archer was much better than most of the captains.

Archer didn't lose a single crewman until "ANOMALY", second episode of season 3. That means it took until the 54th episode before a death of one of his people. And on a larger mission like the Xindi one, you would expect casualties to occur.


Kirk? He's the reason 'redshirt' is a trope.

Picard? Oddly enough, more people died on the ship than on all away teams combined. ("Heart of Glory", "Where Silence Has Lease", "Q Who", 'The High Ground", "The Best of Both Worlds", "In Theory"... the list goes on.)

Janeway? Season 2 alone had a bunch, never mind the other seasons. (Or the initial hurl into the Delta Quadrant.)

This has been discussed before but by the end of TATV, Archer had lost about 29 persons, well over 1/3rd of his crew. No one sane would have wanted to step onboard that widowmaker.

 

[Frostscape One]

This has been discussed before but by the end of TATV, Archer had lost about 29 persons, well over 1/3rd of his crew. No one sane would have wanted to step onboard that widowmaker.

And nearly all of Archer's losses were the Xindi mission, season 3... a mission expected to have a high casualty rate. It was, for all intents and purposes, a wartime mission.

Kirk and Picard? Those were all during peacetime. No sane person would voluntarily want to step on board either of those commands.

 

[XCV330]

And nearly all of Archer's losses were the Xindi mission, season 3... a mission expected to have a high casualty rate. It was, for all intents and purposes, a wartime mission.

Kirk and Picard? Those were all during peacetime. No sane person would voluntarily want to step on board either of those commands.

Picard's losses were relatively low. Especially for a ship being flown into the unknown with civillians and children on board. WHY Starfleet thought it would be great to put nurseries and kindergartens in an active warship.. well that's just Late Stage Roddenberry stuff.

 

[Christmas Canon Spock]

There probably actually is an amusing argument to be made that Kirk is uniquely bad as a captain if TOS is taken literally rather than in the mythic/theatrical spirit in which it's intended. Loses a crewmember every five seconds then laughs about it, almost loses the ship every other week, loses a communicator on a pre-warp planet and brushes it off with a joke...

Then again, Tracey still wins. Truly unbelievable man, there is simply nobody like him.

Indeed. The sensible chuckle that started to occur was annoying. Contrast that with the end of Balance of Terror and Kirk comes across far better.

 

[Frostscape One]

Picard's losses were relatively low. Especially for a ship being flown into the unknown with civillians and children on board. WHY Starfleet thought it would be great to put nurseries and kindergartens in an active warship.. well that's just Late Stage Roddenberry stuff.

If you want to do it by percentage, okay. That doesn't mean he was safe. Picard lost more people in just the episodes I named than Archer did in four full seasons.


I do agree with you that having kids on a starship is a terrible idea.

But considering how often Picard stayed within Federation space... was he really flying into the unknown as much as some think?

 

[DonIago]

Esteban gets portrayed as a bad captain, but his caution was warranted. If anything, he wasn't cautious enough. He was sent to the Genesis planet, where Starfleet knew fully well there would be other interested parties, in a tiny barely armed ship.

Hmm. Is it possible Starfleet Command wasn't aware that the Klingons had BoPs with cloaks (at that point in time), or that the cloak used by this BoP was newer tech and hence Grissom couldn't have reasonably anticipated the danger they were in? Just how close is the Mutara Sector to Klingon space anyhow?

 

[Frostscape One]

Sulu was aware of a typical crew compliment of a Bird of Prey when Kirk asked, and Sulu did correctly estimate the ripple effect was that ship.

So Starfleet is at least aware of it.