MLB

MLB Power Rankings Update: Toronto Takes the Lead as Baseball's Best

The Blue Jays were active at the trade deadline, and it's certainly paying off.

Here at numberFire, we like math. We're not about subjectivity. So when we calculate our power rankings, it's not based on what our eyes are telling us or what our feelings say. It's based on straight up math.

For baseball, we use our nERD metric to show how good a team actually is performing. nERD, for those of you who are unaware, tells us how many runs a team should win by against a league-average opponent on a neutral field. A nERD of 1.00, for instance, means that team would beat an ordinary one by a run. If that team was facing a squad with a nERD of -0.5, we'd expect them to win by 1.5 runs.

Take a look at how things are shaping up around Major League Baseball, sorted by nERD.

TeamPlayoffsChampsDivisionnERD
Toronto Blue Jays94.10%18.70%67.10%1.09
Los Angeles Dodgers91.40%22.30%85.60%1.05
Houston Astros85.60%8.40%73.50%0.75
St. Louis Cardinals100.00%10.00%91.70%0.59
San Francisco Giants34.30%3.00%13.80%0.56
New York Yankees76.60%3.80%25.90%0.52
Oakland Athletics0.30%0.00%0.00%0.45
Cleveland Indians8.70%0.10%0.20%0.44
Tampa Bay Rays32.40%1.20%4.20%0.43
Chicago Cubs77.30%3.20%2.60%0.32
Kansas City Royals99.70%14.60%99.60%0.31
New York Mets84.80%6.80%82.60%0.29
Los Angeles Angels48.30%2.10%22.20%0.17
Baltimore Orioles27.60%0.80%2.80%0.15
Pittsburgh Pirates87.50%3.60%5.70%0.12
Washington Nationals22.90%1.00%17.30%0.1
Cincinnati Reds0.00%0.00%0.00%0.07
Seattle Mariners4.30%0.10%1.30%-0.04
Arizona Diamondbacks1.30%0.00%0.50%-0.09
Detroit Tigers3.70%0.00%0.10%-0.1
San Diego Padres0.40%0.00%0.10%-0.34
Miami Marlins0.00%0.00%0.00%-0.39
Milwaukee Brewers0.00%0.00%0.00%-0.6
Texas Rangers7.90%0.20%2.90%-0.65
Boston Red Sox0.00%0.00%0.00%-0.65
Chicago White Sox1.90%0.00%0.00%-0.79
Minnesota Twins8.80%0.00%0.20%-0.85
Atlanta Braves0.10%0.00%0.10%-1.12
Colorado Rockies0.00%0.00%0.00%-1.26
Philadelphia Phillies0.00%0.00%0.00%-1.53