MLB Power Rankings: Yankees, Dodgers look unbeatable while Phillies plummet

Welcome to the eighth edition of theScore's MLB Power Rankings for the 2019 season. Rankings will be published every second Monday throughout the regular season, with the next installment coming July 8.

1. Los Angeles Dodgers

Rookies Matt Beaty, Alex Verdugo, and Will Smith all clubbed walk-off homers against the Rockies over the weekend. Those heroics came along with dominant performances on the mound from Walker Buehler and Cy Young Award candidate Hyun-Jin Ryu. As usual, it seems like nothing can slow these Dodgers down - at least during the regular season.

2. New York Yankees

The already powerful Yankees grabbed AL home-run leader Edwin Encarnacion, got both Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Judge back from the injured list, and then swept the Rays before taking three of four from the Astros. Sure, they still need some starting pitching, but the Bronx Bombers look ready to run away from the pack.

3. Minnesota Twins

The Twins' offense is showing no signs of slowing down, as Minnesota leads the majors in home runs (147) with seven players in double digits. Breakout seasons from Max Kepler (.903 OPS), Jorge Polanco (.925), and C.J. Cron (.882) have been big factors, while starters Jose Berrios and Jake Odorizzi look like Cy Young contenders.

4. Houston Astros

The Astros are so unbelievably great that they sustained a seven-game skid and still sit 19 games above .500. Rookie slugger Yordan Alvarez has made an immediate impact by slashing .333/.429/.813 with seven home runs over his first 12 MLB games. When George Springer is back from injury, you better believe the 21-year-old Alvarez won't be the player sent down.

5. Atlanta Braves

Rookie phenom Mike Soroka came away with a mere bruise after being hit by a pitch on Sunday, which is fantastic news for Atlanta as it begins to pull away in the NL East. The Braves have won five straight series, while the Phillies are the only other team in the division with a record above .500 - and they've lost seven consecutive games.

6. Tampa Bay Rays

The gap between the struggling Rays and the red-hot Yankees is growing, as Tampa Bay has lost 10 of 16 and sits 4 1/2 games behind New York. However, Rays second baseman Brandon Lowe (.874 OPS) looks like the real deal and could end up taking home Rookie of the Year honors. To make up ground, Tampa will need ace Blake Snell to shake his funk. The left-hander is coming off the worst start of his career after recording just one out versus the Bronx Bombers.

7. Chicago Cubs

After sputtering through June with a .500 record, the Cubs narrowly escaped disaster by splitting a four-game series against the nightmarish Mets. Javier Baez's 100th career home run wound up lifting Chicago in the finale, which could mean big things for the team going forward. Baez had been on a bit of a cold streak - posting a .218/.238/.474 slash line in June entering Sunday - but the Cubs might distance themselves from the Brewers and Cardinals if the 26-year-old relocates his power stroke.

8. Boston Red Sox

The Red Sox need to find someone who can consistently lock down saves. Boston's blown 15 of them this season, which is tied for the most in the AL. Meanwhile, this club can mash with anyone but needs more from one-two hitters Mookie Betts (.852 OPS) and Andrew Benintendi (.791). At least the return of a healthy Nathan Eovaldi should give the starting rotation a boost.

9. Milwaukee Brewers

Where would the Brewers be without Yasmani Grandal? After last year's revolving door behind the plate, Grandal has stabilized the position in Milwaukee by posting the best season among all big-league catchers to date. The Brewers have stumbled a bit of late, but Grandal has still posted a 1.065 OPS across the last two weeks.

10. St. Louis Cardinals

After nine wins in their last 14 games, the Cardinals are near the top of the NL Central again - with plenty of room for improvement. Paul DeJong (.840) and Marcell Ozuna (.848) are the only regulars with an OPS above .800, while Dakota Hudson (3.36 ERA) is having the best season of any starter, which isn't great considering a lot was expected from Miles Mikolas and Jack Flaherty after stellar 2018 campaigns.

11. Colorado Rockies

With help from the thin air of Colorado, the Rockies and San Diego Padres recently set a record for the most runs scored in a four-game series with 92. While nobody's ERA was spared, Charlie Blackmon continued to turn around his season. Since returning to the lineup in early June, the outfielder is hitting .420 with eight homers and only nine strikeouts. Colorado still has work to do, but the team is back in wild-card contention despite giving up three straight walk-off homers to the Dodgers over the weekend.

12. Cleveland Indians

The emergence of rookie starter Zach Plesac (2.33 ERA in six starts) has helped steady a Cleveland rotation that's been decimated by injuries. Still, even a recent hot streak led by Plesac didn't help the Indians gain ground on the Twins in the Central.

13. Texas Rangers

Although he's currently on the IL, Hunter Pence's comeback season with the Rangers - 15 HRs and a .962 OPS after signing a minor-league deal in the winter - is one of the best stories of the year. So are the Rangers, who continue to quietly sneak up on the reeling Astros despite supposedly being in rebuild mode. It could be a very interesting summer in Texas.

14. Oakland Athletics

Oakland was in the midst of a pretty hot June until breakout starter Frankie Montas was hit with an 80-game suspension for performance-enhancing drugs. The A's were already desperate for rotation help, and Montas had been their steadiest pitcher, authoring a 2.70 ERA and 2.86 FIP over 15 starts. Now, Oakland's in a precarious position as it heads toward the All-Star break with nine of its next 12 contests on the road.

15. Philadelphia Phillies

The Phillies have been nothing short of unwatchable lately, dropping seven straight tilts that included a three-game sweep at home against the abysmal Miami Marlins. There is plenty of blame to go around, but here's an incomplete list of players with a higher OPS than Bryce Harper this year: Jorge Soler, Tommy La Stella, David Peralta, Yandy Diaz, Shin-Soo Choo, and Ketel Marte.

16. San Diego Padres

Manny Machado is cooking at the plate. The star infielder has seen his .723 OPS on June 11 jump to .847 with a torrid stretch that included eight multi-hit games and six round-trippers. Hunter Renfroe (23 home runs) is another guy who's been tearing the cover off the ball and he could draw a lot of interest should the team decide to sell at the deadline. Meanwhile, closer Kirby Yates, who's blown just one save all season, may wind up being the best reliever available.

17. Washington Nationals

Washington finally (and mercifully) ended the Trevor Rosenthal experiment Sunday, releasing the former All-Star following another dismal performance. Unfortunately for manager Dave Martinez, the relievers still on his roster haven't pitched much better of late, and the Nats still can't string a prolonged run of wins together.

18. Arizona Diamondbacks

The Diamondbacks have come back to Earth despite the outsized contributions of utility man Ketel Marte, who's posted a ridiculous .510/.545/.980 slash line with six home runs over his last 55 plate appearances. The rotation has simply not been up to the task, as its starters have combined to author a pretty bleak 4.83 ERA over the last 21 games, even relying on reliever Archie Bradley to start one of them (he allowed four runs over 1 1/3 innings).

19. Cincinnati Reds

The Reds are playing their best baseball of the season and have crawled back into a tight NL Central race with a six-game winning streak. Yasiel Puig's hot bat has powered the offense with five homers in the last 10 days along with a white-hot 1.409 OPS. Luis Castillo is coming off a rough outing against the Brewers, but he still leads the NL in hits allowed per nine innings.

20. Los Angeles Angels

It seems almost unimaginable that this past weekend was Albert Pujols' first trip back to St. Louis since signing his 10-year deal with the Angels more than seven seasons ago. Times have changed, and the future Hall of Famer is no longer an impact hitter, but another future HOFer in teammate Mike Trout has since surpassed Rafael Palmiero, Scott Rolen, Ivan Rodriguez, Gary Carter, Jim Thome, Ozzie Smith, and Willie McCovey in career WAR.

21. Pittsburgh Pirates

The Pirates are hanging around in the hyper-competitive NL Central, largely thanks to the hitting of Josh Bell and rookie Bryan Reynolds. But even after a miracle win on Sunday that pushed their winning streak to four games, the Bucs just don't have enough pitching to stay afloat much longer, and rank last in the division with a horrid minus-72 run differential.

22. New York Mets

Sunday's clubhouse mayhem was just another setback amid what's been a disappointing season in Queens. But despite the chaos, Pete Alonso continues to put up historic numbers in his first MLB season. The young slugger has already passed Darryl Strawberry's team mark for homers by a rookie, and has broken the NL record for dingers before the All-Star break with 27. Next up for Alonso is Mark McGwire's MLB record of 33 before the Midsummer Classic.

23. Chicago White Sox

After a ho-hum start to the season and an ankle injury, Eloy Jimenez has met expectations with an .866 OPS and nine homers across 119 plate appearances. If the AL rookie race remains stagnant, the slugger could easily squeak back into the conversation.

24. San Francisco Giants

Alex Dickerson, acquired from the Padres earlier in June, was summoned from Triple-A over the weekend and immediately went off in Arizona. However, his stellar debut has arguably been the lone bright spot in the Giants' increasingly dismal campaign.

25. Seattle Mariners

Edwin Encarnacion recently followed fellow slugger Jay Bruce as the second high-profile veteran to be traded by the Mariners this season, and it appears this is just the beginning of a fire-sale. General manager Jerry Dipoto will be a popular man with the trade deadline just five weeks away.

26. Miami Marlins

Over the past two weeks, Marlins rookie Jordan Yamamoto emerged to post a 0.95 ERA in his first three MLB starts - a span that included two history-making shutouts. Then, on Saturday, 35-year-old catcher Wilkin Castillo laced the game-winning double in his first MLB game since 2009. Those were two pretty cool moments that brought a little light to a Marlins season that's been predictably drab.

27. Toronto Blue Jays

Hold off on the Hall of Fame plaque for Vladimir Guerrero Jr., as the 20-year-old slugger has yet to flaunt the elite plate discipline and power that made him such a highly touted prospect. Instead, his .745 OPS is just a rounding error away from Miguel Cabrera's this year, which is an unflattering comparison at this stage of Miggy's career. All is not lost with Toronto's youth movement, though, as Cavan Biggio has been tearing the cover off the ball with an .810 OPS and a team-leading 18.6 percent walk rate.

28. Detroit Tigers

Not a single everyday player for the Tigers owns an OPS of .800 or higher, and the team has posted the third-worst mark (.670) in baseball overall. At least left-hander Matthew Boyd sits in the top 10 in WAR and could bring back a nice haul if Detroit trades him to a contender. Outfielder Nicholas Castellanos is also likely to land elsewhere by the deadline before he hits free agency in the offseason.

29. Kansas City Royals

The Royals finally removed 2018 breakout Ryan O'Hearn from their 25-man roster after he posted a dismal .188/.286/.333 slash line. In his place, Kansas City called up Jorge Bonifacio, who hadn't been much better in Triple-A this year but has gone 7-for-20 with three doubles in a five-game stretch so far.

30. Baltimore Orioles

The Orioles have just two wins in their last 13 games as another nightmare season continues. The team has allowed a mind-blowing 156 home runs - by far the most in the majors - and owns a collective 5.93 ERA. It will be interesting to see what the club does with Trey Mancini (.928 OPS), who could be a piece to build around but could also fetch a nice trade return.