MLS Power Ranking Averages - Week 21

LAFC retain first for 17th week.

Only 11 of 16 sites updated this week. Los Angeles FC maintain their run in first for the 17th week, and there are very few signs that anyone is closing the gap as 2nd place continues to change weekly.

As always, if you know of a site I have not used please let me know in the comments and I’ll look into adding it!

Sites Used

• Jeff Sagarin
• Five Thirty Eight (Proj. points)
• Who Scored
• ESPN
• Massey
• Soccer America - No ranking Wk 21
• MLS
• MLS Fantasy Boss - No ranking Wk 20-21
• Reddit MLS
• Dallas News - No ranking Wk 21
• Atlanta News Now (Abbr. AJC)
• Big D Soccer (FC Dallas blog, analytic prediction) - No ranking Wk 21
• Pro Soccer USA - No ranking Wk 21
• Cincinnati Soccer Talk
• Freeborg Power Index
• In On It

You may notice the list includes several ‘analytic’ sites; they serve to function as a stable counterbalance or ‘control group’ to the rest which are based more on personal opinions, and those done by ‘team’ blogs. There are also sites included that some will argue are ‘prediction rankings’ - but that also is a form of Power Ranking is (see the quote at the top).

All the averages use the Olympic method (I.E. Truncated Mean value) of dropping the highest and lowest scores, and then averaging the rest to reduce bias.

The 7 year weighted average is the averages that decrease in value over time. Thus 2019 will be worth 100%, 2018 = 90%, 2017 = 80% and so on down. Thus a bad year 4 years ago won’t drag down positive recent years. For expansion teams that don’t have long histories, they are given the overall league average for that year.

• Highest Standard Deviation: San Jose Earthquakes at 5.26
• Lowest Standard Deviation: Los Angeles FC 0.0
• Biggest Rise: Portland Timbers - Up 3
• Biggest Fall: Atlanta United, Colorado Rapids, LA Galaxy, Orlando City, Philadelphia Union - Down 2

Site Bias

All sites are going to have bias, whether conscious (blogs) or due to analytic calculation (based on past performance). This section lets you see the extent that sites are biased for/against teams.

Site Accuracy

Just a little table to show how far each site deviated from the week’s average.

• Most Accurate: Reddit r/MLS with 11 exactly on average.
• Least Accurate: In On It with 6 off by 6+.