{"id":15381,"date":"2011-05-11T12:30:11","date_gmt":"2011-05-11T17:30:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/?p=15381"},"modified":"2011-05-11T12:31:40","modified_gmt":"2011-05-11T17:31:40","slug":"nl-betting-preview-saint-louis-cardinals-at-chicago-cubs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/nl-betting-preview-saint-louis-cardinals-at-chicago-cubs-15381\/","title":{"rendered":"NL Betting Preview: Saint Louis Cardinals At Chicago Cubs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Saint Louis Cardinals (21-15)\u00a0 AT Chicago Cubs (15-19)<\/strong>
\nMay 11, 2011 at 8:05 PM EST<\/strong>, TV:ESPN<\/strong>
\nOpening Moneyline:\u00a0 CHI -115, STL -105<\/strong>
\nCurrent Moneyline:\u00a0 CHI -123, STL +113<\/strong>
\nOpening Total:\u00a0 8.5<\/strong>
\nCurrent Total:\u00a0 8.5<\/strong><\/p>\n

SP:\u00a0 STL- M. Garza, CHI- J. Westbrook<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Albert Pujols experienced a career worst year last year, and it was still among the best in the majors<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Cardinals have now won 4 of their last 5 and 9 of their last 13 and they took the series opener against the Cubs by a score of 6-4.\u00a0 The Cardinals received the unfortunate news before that game that manager Tony LaRussa will miss the next 5 games or so while he waits for the medication to work on his shingles.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were glad when he finally went out to find out what\u2019s going on with him,\u201d Cardinals bench coach Joe Pettini said. \u201cHopefully taking the week off will help him get over this thing for good and hopefully when we get back he\u2019s ready to step back in the dugout.\u201d\u00a0 Pettini will be running the club in the absence of LaRussa.<\/p>\n

The Cardinals “rallied to win one for the skipper,” as Albert Pujols continued his hot hitting that followed a horrible start to 2011.\u00a0 He had 4 hits to raise his batting average up to .268 on the season.\u00a0 Pujols’ PECOTA projection calls for a .322 BA with 41 HRs and 121 RBIs.\u00a0 While he’s a far cry from being on pace to reach that lofty projection, his number should only get better on the year as the law of averages takes hold.<\/p>\n

It wasn’t that the Cubs didn’t hit the ball well in the series opener, it was that all the hits taht they did have were mere singles.\u00a0 They didn’t manage a single multi base hit.\u00a0 Yet, despite that problem, manager Mike Quade was more upset about the defense.\u00a0 \u201cProbably more upset about the defense, some of the plays we didn\u2019t make,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Jake Westbrook will take the mound for the Cardinals.\u00a0 He’s struggled badly this year and has a 6.14 ERA.\u00a0 However, he’s been hot of late and has recorded a 2.45 ERA over his last three starts, all games which the Cardinals have won.\u00a0 In his last outing, against the Marlins, Westbrook pitched 6 1\/3rds innings, allowing 3 runs while striking out a season high eight batters.\u00a0 Westbrook’s PECOTA projection predicts an 8-7 record with a 4.65 ERA.\u00a0 If he can continue to pitch in the groove he’s been in, he may get below that, but it’s an uphill battle at this point.<\/p>\n

Matt Garza takes the mound for the Cubs.\u00a0 He has yet to win a game at home, where he is 0-2 with a good 3.24 ERA.\u00a0 Getting run production will obviously prove crucial, as Garza has the ability to keep teams low on the scoreboard.\u00a0 He didn’t Friday in Cincinnati, however, allowing 5 runs in 6 innings. In his only career start against the Cardinals he gave up 7 runs and 10 hits in 4 1\/3rds innings.\u00a0 He’ll have to do much better than that to give the Cubs a fighting chance.<\/p>\n

Some betting trends:<\/p>\n

Saint Louis is 4-1 SU over their last 5 games and the total has gone OVER in 10 of their last 14 games.\u00a0 The total has also gone OVER In 6 of their last 7 on the road.\u00a0 The Cardinals are 5-1 SU in their last 6 road games and the total has gone OVER in 5 of the last 6 against the Cubs.\u00a0 The Cardinals are 3-6 SU in their last 9 against the Cubs and the total has gone OVER\u00a0 in 4 of the last 5 games on the road in Chicago.\u00a0 The Cardinals are 4-1 SU in their last 5 games on the road against the Cubs.<\/p>\n

The total has gone UNDER in 8 of the Cubs’ last 10 games.\u00a0 The Cubs are 1-6 SU in their last 7 games at home and they are 6-3 SU in their last 9 against the Saint Louis Cardinals.\u00a0 The total has gone OVER in 5 of the Cubs’ last 6 games against the Cardinals.\u00a0 The total has also gone OVER in 4 of the Cubs’ last 5 games at home against the Cardinals.\u00a0 The Cubs are 1-4 SU in their last 5 games at home against Saint Louis.<\/p>\n

Given Garza’s recent pitching, the Cubs have a good shot at this game, especially in light of Westbrook’s struggles.\u00a0 However, Garza’s only career start against Saint Louis is somewhat troubling.\u00a0 It’s unclear whether it can be written off as an abberant game or the sign of a trend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Saint Louis Cardinals (21-15)\u00a0 AT Chicago Cubs (15-19) May 11, 2011 at 8:05 PM EST, TV:ESPN Opening Moneyline:\u00a0 CHI -115, STL -105 Current Moneyline:\u00a0 CHI -123, STL +113 Opening Total:\u00a0 8.5 Current Total:\u00a0 8.5 SP:\u00a0 STL- M. Garza, CHI- J. Westbrook The Cardinals have now won 4 of their last 5 and 9 of their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40250,"featured_media":5042,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1444],"tags":[180,4834],"class_list":["post-15381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-headlines","tag-chicago-cubs","tag-saint-louis-cardinals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15381","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40250"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15381"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15381\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15383,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15381\/revisions\/15383"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5042"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.madduxsports.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}