Last year was a pretty good year for law firms in the Second Hundred of the Am Law 200. In fact, they notched one of their best years in terms of revenue growth in the last decade. But if you take a broader view, and compare how those firms are doing relative to their peers in the upper crust of the index, things don't look quite as rosy.

While the combined gross revenue of Second Hundred firms has grown just over 14% since fiscal year 2009, the group's share of the entire Am Law 200 gross revenue has actually slid — by 20%. That's in large part because the top 100 firms in the index have been gobbling up cash. Firms holding the top 25 spots in the Am Law 200 saw their combined gross revenue rise by almost 65% over the same period.

The chasm in terms of growth is perhaps best exemplified by this data point in The American Lawyer's feature story on this year's Am Law 200: Kirkland & Ellis, the nation's largest firm by revenue, added more revenue from 2017 to 2018 ($592 million) than all of the Second Hundred combined ($588 million).

At the same time, some in the Second Hundred seem to be struggling to contain costs, The American Lawyer notes. Firms within the Am Law 76 to 100 slots saw costs rise 0.6%, while costs rose 1.5% for Nos. 101 to 125 ranked firms; 3.7% for firms 126 to 150, and 3% for firms 151 to 175 and 176 to 200.