‘Dancing with the Stars 23’ rankings: Are Calvin Johnson, James Hinchcliffe, Laurie Hernandez locks for finale?

We wish we could say that we’re in the thick of one of the most competitive seasons of “Dancing with the Stars” to date, but we’d be lying if we were to say it’s that close. While there is some competition at the top, the next few weeks feel extremely predictable given the divide that is there between some of the best and worst acts so far this season.  Maybe we’ll have a surprise creep into the final four, but for now it feels somewhat hard to imagine that happening.

Let’s get to our rankings for the week, which are again judged by a criteria including performance quality, screen time, and also individual / partner popularity.

7. Ryan Lochte and Cheryl Burke (last week: 8) – He’s made it further than we ever thought he would going into the show. We’re just now at the point where it is starting to feel abundantly clear that he is the worst dancer still in the show, and it’s not going to benefit him to stay in the competition any longer than this.

6. Marilu Henner and Derek Hough (6) – The biggest thing seemingly holding Henner back at the moment are her injuries, which have mounted over the past few weeks. We think Ryan is more culturally relevant than Marilu right now, but having Derek, arguably the show’s most-famous pro, as a partner helps offset that.

5. Jana Kramer and Gleb Savchenko (5) – Given how little we knew about her before the season and how Gleb is a virtual known to American viewers, it’s impressive that the two parties have made it this far. It’s just now starting to get hard to envision the journey continuing too much further beyond this.

4. Terra Jole and Sasha Farber (4) – We know, this is getting rather boring with the rankings all staying the same, but we’re not seeing any justification to change them based on how popular we perceive certain people being on the show right now.

3. Calvin Johnson and Lindsay Arnold (3) – Terra probably has more of an inspirational story than Calvin, and that makes her a threat to him being in the top three. Yet, we think he has a slight edge in terms of being a stronger overall dancer.

2. James Hinchcliffe and Sharna Burgess (2) – He’s really the only person with a chance to steal the top spot out from Laurie. We don’t care that she’s had some lower scores as of late; we think she’ll have some close-to-perfect ones in the finale.

1. Laurie Hernandez and Val Chmerkovskiy (1) – In what universe is Laurie not winning? We’re assuming that the scores will be there, so with that in mind the only way we see something crazy happening is if for whatever reason she struggles mightily or one of the other contestants strikes some huge emotional chord that wins America over.

Now, let’s turn this over to you! Vote for your favorite in the attached poll.

Want to get some other news when it comes to “Dancing with the Stars”? Then head over here, since that is where you can see some of our dance spoilers for the next upcoming episode of the show! (Photo: ABC.)