The St. Louis Cardinals rise to the top spot in this week’s Box-Toppers team rankings.
The Cardinals, top National League team for the second straight week, rise from third place overall to take the top spot. In addition, the Cardinals picked up more Box-Toppers points than any other team during the past week—7.7. The Cardinals also have baseball’s best winning percentage (.750).
Top 10 teams
Here are Box-Toppers' Top 10 teams, through the games of Thursday, May 7. The column BTP shows the number of Box-Toppers points players on the team have accumulated so far this season. The column BTP/wk shows have many points teams have accumulated in the past week.5/7 |
Teams |
BTP |
BTP /wk |
Last wk rank |
| 1 | Cardinals | 24.9 | 7.7 | 3 |
| 2 | Astros | 21.9 | 4.5 | 2 |
| 3 | Dodgers | 21.5 | 6.0 | 9 |
| 4 | Royals | 21.5 | 5.0 | 6 |
| 5 | Tigers | 21.3 | 3.7 | 1 |
| 6 | Yankees | 20.7 | 5.0 | 7 |
| 7 | Reds | 20.3 | 3.5 | 5 |
| 8 | Mets | 19.9 | 3.0 | 4 |
| 9 | Twins | 18.4 | 7.2 | 24 |
| 10 | Marlins | 17.7 | 4.0 | 12 |
Cardinals players have accumulated 24.9 Box-Toppers points this season and are led by pitchers Adam Wainwright and Carlos Martinez, who each have 3.0 Box-Toppers points. (However, Wainwright is out with an achilles injury for the remainder of the season.) The team’s top batter, Matt Carpenter, has 2.5 Box-Toppers points.
The Houston Astros passed the Detroit Tigers to take the lead among American League teams this week. Astros players have accumulated 21.9 Box-Toppers points and are in second place among all teams, their same position as last week. The Astros also have the AL’s best winning percentage (.655).
The Astros are led by pitcher Dallas Keuchel (4.7 Box-Toppers points) and left fielder Colby Rasmus (3.0 points).
The Tigers, who led Box-Toppers team rankings for the previous three weeks, fell to fifth place overall with 21.3 Box-Toppers points.
Two teams rose into the top 10 this week:
- The Minnesota Twins rose from 24th to ninth place with 18.4 Box-Toppers points. The Twins had the biggest gain in Box-Toppers points this past week among AL teams—7.2.
- The Miami Marlins rose from 12th to 10th place with 17.7 Box-Toppers points.
Two teams fell out of the top 10:
- The Chicago Cubs fell from eighth to 11th place with 17.5 Box-Toppers points.
- The Pittsburgh Pirates fell from 10th to 18th place with 16.2 Box-Toppers points.
The lowest-ranked team is the Chicago White Sox with 10.5 Box-Toppers points, falling from 28th place last week. Last week’s lowest-ranked team, the Milwaukee Brewers rose to 29th place with 11.2 Box-Toppers points.
About Box-Toppers—Box-Toppers tracks who most helps their team win the most games. Using standard box score statistics, Box-Toppers uses a simple formula to determine a Player of the Game for each Major League Baseball game played. That player is the person who contributed most to his team’s win. In regular season games, players earn 1.0 Box-Toppers point for being named Player of the Game and can earn bonus points for being Player of the Day or top player or batter in their league for the day.