MLB Power Rankings – April 23, 2018

The 2018 Baseball Season is underway! Here is the first week of The Grueling Truth’s MLB Power Rankings. They take in a combination of Wins and Losses, the SD Score, and lastly, for at least the month of April, how they entered into 2018.

(For an explanation of how the SD Score is calculated, see below) The number to the right is where they were ranked last week.

1 – Boston Red Sox (17-4); SD Score +3.32  (1)

2 – Houston Astros (16-7); SD Score +2.97 (9)

3 – Arizona Diamondbacks (15-6), SD Score +1.53  (3)

4 – Philadelphia Phillies (14-7); SD Score +1.69  (5)

5 – Atlanta Braves (12-8); SD Score +1.78  (8)

6 – Toronto Blue Jays (13-8); SD Score +1.52  (6)

7 – NY Mets (14-6), SD Score +0.80 (4)

8 – St. Louis Cardinals (13-8); SD Score +1.37  (11)

9 – LA Angels (14-8); SD Score +0.91  (2)

10 – Chicago Cubs (10-9); SD Score +1.28  (14)

11 – NY Yankees (11-9); SD Score +0.77  (15)

12 – Cleveland Indians (11-8); SD Score +0.53  (13)

13 – Milwaukee Brewers (14-9); SD Score +0.26  (19)

14 – LA Dodgers (10-10); SD Score +0.69  (20)

15 – Pittsburgh (12-10); SD Score +0.47  (7)

16 – Oakland A’s (11-11); SD Score +0.48 (21)

17 – Seattle Mariners (11-9); SD Score -0.62  (12)

18 – Minnesota Twins (8-8); SD Score -0.25  (10)

19 – Detroit Tigers (9-11); SD Score +0.21  (23)

20 – Washington Nationals (10-12); SD Score -0.34  (18)

21 – Colorado Rockies (12-11); SD Score -1.07  (16)

22 – San Francisco Giants (9-12); SD Score -0.61  (22)

23 – Tampa Bay Rays (8-13); SD Score -1.00 (29)

24 – San Diego Padres (8-15); SD Score -1.32  (17)

25 – Texas (8-15); SD Score -1.76  (25)

26 – Kansas City Royals (5-15); SD Score -2.30  (26)

27 – Baltimore (6-16); SD Score -2.51  (27)

28 – Chicago White Sox (4-14); SD Score -2.91  (24)

29 – Miami Marlins (5-16); SD Score -2.97  (28)

30 – Cincinnati Reds (3-18); SD Score -2.93  (29)

SD Score explanation:

Run production is one of the best measures of how a team is performing and how dominant or bad they are.

The formula takes each team’s runs scored and runs allowed totals and how many standard deviations from the league average they are.

Example: 1927 Yankees

The 27 Yankees score 975 runs (1927 AL average was 762 and SD of team runs for the AL was about 115). Take the difference from the league average (975-762=213) and divide by the SD (115), the 1927 Yankees were 1.85 SD above the league average in runs scored.

They allowed 599 runs (the SD in runs allowed for the 1927 AL was about 88.5), which was 163 runs less than the league average. 163/88.5 gives us a 1.84 SD above the league average in runs allowed.

Add 1.85 and 1.84 to get a final SD Score of +3.69 for the 1927 Yankees, which is amazing.

(SD ranking explanation found in “Baseball Dynasties: The Greatest Teams of All Time” by Rob Neyer and Eddie Epstein)