Are the two best teams in baseball represented in this year's World Series?

The St. Louis Cardinals had the best record in baseball this year with 105 wins. The Red Sox, however, only had the second best record in the American League with 98 wins. They beat the team with the most wins (101) in the American League, the New York Yankees, to reach the Series.

But another way to look at this, and I believe a better way, is to look at run differential, the difference between runs scored and runs allowed as a team. The Cardinals had the largest run differential in the National League (196 more scored than allowed). The Red Sox actually surpassed the Yankees in this department having a run differential of 181 runs vs. only 89 for New York. The Boston total was the largest differential in the AL.

Finally, a new statistic developed by Bill James has been released in this year's version of The Bill James Handbook. It's called Team Efficiency. It looks at the underlying statistics of the team (hits, walks, doubles, home runs, etc. for the team hitters and against the team pitchers). Based on these stats, a term called efficient wins is calculated. If the Red Sox were "efficient" they would have won 106 games, the most in baseball. That's eight more wins than they actually had. The Cardinals efficient total would have been 101 wins, two less than actual.

While at this point with Boston being up in the Series on the Cardinals 2-0 it's not going out on a limb, these statistics do indicate that indeed the two best teams are in the series and that the Red Sox, if they're "efficient," will win it.