The Yankees are No. 1 in the mlb power rankings after winning 16 of their last 19 games. They reached the top this week with the majors' best team ERA and the kind of steady run that moved them past the Braves.
Yankees and Cody Bellinger
Cody Bellinger has been a key part of the push. The Yankees outfielder went 14-for-his-last-26 with 10 extra-base hits and 13 RBIs, production that matches the club's climb from a strong contender to the league's top-ranked team.
New York also trailed only the Braves in scoring, which puts the ranking change in sharper focus. The team was not relying on one narrow edge; it paired run production with the lowest team ERA in the majors and a 16-3 stretch over its last 19 games.
Braves Cubs Rays
The Braves dropped to No. 2 after holding the top spot the previous week. They went 4-2 on a Colorado and Seattle road trip, but that still left them with just one series win over a team with a winning record, and that win came against the 20-19 Guardians.
Chicago and Tampa Bay both kept pressure on the top tier. The Cubs won all seven games of their homestand, stretched a home winning streak to 15 straight games going back to April 12, and beat the Reds on three consecutive walk-offs from Monday to Wednesday. The Rays were 20-2 against everyone else, 5-10 against NL Central opponents, and carried a seven-game winning streak into a run of 13 victories in 14 games.
Brice Turang and the Pack
The award-tracker side of the update put Brice Turang in the spotlight. The Brewers infielder entered Thursday with a.439 on-base percentage, a top-five OPS mark, and a position-player WAR trail only to Matt Olson, a rise that began after Milwaukee drafted him 21st overall in 2018.
Elsewhere, the Padres were still waiting on Fernando Tatis Jr.'s first home run while sitting in a recent 3-6 stretch, and the Cardinals had a winning record on a homestand against the Dodgers and Brewers with a top-10 offense and pitching that had been better than expected. The Pirates answered a five-game losing streak by sweeping the Reds and taking two of three from Arizona, while the Mariners had spent exactly one day above.500 and were a game out of the AL West lead after taking two of three from the Braves.
For the Yankees, the ranking change is already backed by the numbers that matter most: 16 wins in 19 games, the best ERA in baseball, and a lineup getting direct production from Bellinger as the race for No. 1 keeps moving.
