Diego Simeone hailed La Liga's depth after Atletico Madrid defeated Almeria on Saturday.
Third-place Atletico and Valencia in fourth both took advantage of Barcelona's slip with wins that tightened the race among the top four.
Atletico have 53 points from 24 games, three behind Barca and four behind leaders Madrid -- who play on Sunday -- while Valencia kept pace with 50 points.
The Rojiblancos shocked the world last season by ending a nine-year run of titles from Barcelona and Real Madrid, and Simeone says this season's table is another example of the league becoming more balanced.
"We think about our daily fight with teams that get more attention," Simeone said about Atletico's chase to retain the title.
"Valencia, Sevilla and ourselves, we have an enormous amount of points. That makes a league more competitive that we understand has Madrid and Barcelona as favorites."
Antoine Griezmann drew praise from his manager after scoring his team-leading 13th and 14th league goals to lead Atletico over Almeria.
"Griezmann can play second striker, and does it very well because he is a smart guy," Simeone said.
"He works for the team because he plays well with through balls and I'm convinced that in that area is much more decisive than when playing on the wing because he's away from the goal."
Simeone was happy to rebound from last weekend's 2-0 defeat away to Celta Vigo.
"It was quite a clear match," the manager said. "On minutes 25-30 we pushed, we were intense, managed to attack very well with great speed and intensity above all and in that period we found the result."