Series Preview: The Cardinals travel to that city of the ‘other Lite Beer’ to face the Brewers. Both teams are going to be looking to get back on track, but the team that needs it much much more is the Brewers, owners of a six game losing streak. And in the Brewers dugout, the players had better stay clear of that one seat that might be smoldering a little. That seat is reserved for Ned Yost, who might be close to join many other Americans in the Unemployment Line.
The Cardinals come in losers of their last two and look to maintain their season long streak of not losing more than two in a row. Additionally, the Cardinals need to start moving their won-loss record on the road north of the .500 mark as they have played a mess of games at home in the early going.
The Brewers have not had a starter not named Ben Sheets win a game since Manny Parra did it on April 5th. Friday night’s game is big as the Cardinals do not want to go into Saturday’s game against Sheets already a game down in the unusual four game weekend wrap around series. THEblindhomer is heading to Miller Park to root on the Cardinals over the weekend. Hope to see a lot of Cardinal red!
May 9th – Todd Wellemeyer (3-1, 4.07 ERA, 1.21 WHIP) vs. Manny Parra (1-2, 5,86 ERA, 1.99 WHIP)
The Cardinals are 4 – 3 in Wellemeyer’s starts and usually Wellemeyer keeps the Birds in the game and the Cardinals have had a tendency to score a lot of runs in his starts. However, his last three starts he has struggled with the command and control that was much better in his first four starts of the season.
Parra usually keeps the opposition at three runs or less in his starts, however, he has struggled with walks and has not gone deep in any of his starts, not lasting into the 6th in any of them. As his WHIP suggests, the Cardinals should be successful in getting guys on base, however, the question will be can they get them to cross the plate.
May 10th – Joel Pineiro (2-2, 4.33 ERA, 1.37 WHIP) vs. Ben Sheets (4-0, 2.29 ERA, 0.89 WHIP)
Pineiro looked like he was pitching batting practice in his last start against the Rockies as they were hitting shots all over the Coors Field and finally knocked him out after only three innings pitched. Now, the defense behind him was not the best, and he did get hit on the pitching hand during a plate appearance, but his stuff was not very good. This start will be one to watch to see if he can turn it around against a team that has struggled against righties so far this season.
Sheets is undefeated and will be tough to beat at home in the late afternoon start. His last start out was the first time this season that he allowed more hits than innings pitched, but was touched up for four earned runs. When healthy, this guy has top of the rotation stuff and is a bulldog on the mound. This one looks like a win for the Brew Crew.
May 11th – Braden Looper (5-1, 3.95 ERA, 1.27 WHIP) vs Jeff Suppan (1-2, 5.22 ERA, 1.56 WHIP)
Braden Looper was MONEY in his last start against the Rockies, coming within 2 outs of his first major league complete game. His ERA took a hit when the bully could not strand two inherited runners, but his last three starts have been pretty good. Look for him to continue to streak against the Brewers.
The Brewers are certainly getting their money’s worth out of Suppan. [Pardon me while I snicker just a bit] Ok, that is better. Yes, Jeff usually keeps the game close, and he has had four quality starts out of the seven times he has taken the bump, but I still don’t get how that is worth the contract he got out of the Brewers. Oh, well, this will be the first time they face him this year, and let’s hope they remind him of how the Cardinals can sometime just roll over guys.
May 12th – Adam Wainwright (3-1, 2.25 ERA, 0.96 WHIP) vs Dave Bush (0-4, 6.98 ERA, 1.55 WHIP)
Wainwright continues to impress on his way to being classified as one of the top starters in the National League. He is coming off a nice scoreless effort for seven innings pitched against the Rockies and seems to be at the top of his game right now. Milwaukee better get a bucket of chicken in the clubhouse if they are to have a chance in this one.
Dave Bush is back in the rotation to fill the spot vacated by the injured Yovanni Gallardo. Bush had lost his rotation spot to Gallardo based upon his first four starts of the season and did nothing to indicate that those were a fluke with another flop of a performance against the Marlins on the road. Seems like this one should go the Cardinals as well in a rout.
May 9th – St. Louis 3 Milwaukee 4
The loss. Every major league team must find a way to cope with them. Even the teams that evoke admiration for generations usually lose 40% of there games during the grind of a 162 game schedule.
And then there are those that define a season. Those that are the crossroads. Those losses that either bring a team closer together and sparks the remainder of a high-profile season; or demoralize a team, especially young teams, to fall apart at the seams and sink back into a level of mediocrity.
I do not think that I am overstating things when I say that this particular loss might be that crossroads moment for the St. Louis Cardinals. This one went as some have before; the quick lead in the game followed by the failure to take advantage of opportunities to bury the opponent, thereby taking the life out of them and any attempts to mount a comeback; the key defensive lapse that the starter cannot pitch around; and, finally, the blown save opportunity by the franchise’s leading save leader.
Saturday will be a day of revelations based upon this story in the St. Louis Post Dispatch. Isringhausen is a leader, but even he knows he cannot continue like this, and, as a leader, recognizes something has got to give. His performance last night was the same as in Coors Field: He lacks confidence in his bread and butter pitch, the one that has made him so devastating to the opposition in the past, his cutter. So, he has needed to fall back upon his other pitches and he does not have the pin point command of his fastball or his curve to be able to locate them in order to produce outs consistently.
So, the question now becomes: what will happen to this team when its closer, the guy at the end that is heavily relied upon to seal the deal, especially in a season that shapes up to the Cardinals playing a boat load of close games, cannot get the job done and coughs up potential victories? Potential victories for a team that was projected to not have many potential victories? One that has gotten off to a strong start and had themselves believing that they not only could compete, but could win, in the Central Division?
I don’t know the answer, but one thing is for sure. I know that I am glad that the guy that wears the sunglasses at night is in the Cardinals dugout. If anyone can lead a team through such a mountain pass of uncertainty, he can.
May 10th – St. Louis 5 Milwaukee 3
What a difference a day makes. Ned Yost had his own Izzy moment and subsequently moved Eric Gagne out of the closers role for the time being.
It was a must win type situation after the Cardinals gave one to the Brewers the night before. Facing Ben Sheets, however, would make it a very daunting task. The Cardinals jumped out on top in the third with a Molina single and a Ryan double leading to a Schumaker run scoring ground out. Missed in the shuffle was a Pineiro missed bunt opportunity that possibly could have turned the inning into a two run inning, but let’s not pick on him that much, because he was baffling the Brewers on the mound. The Cardinals padded their lead with an Ankiel single and a Duncan home run off the foul pole in the 4th.
The score stayed that way until the 7th when Pineiro, who had allowed only four base runners through six innings, got into a bases loaded jam with only one out and was relieved by Kyle McClellan. McClellan, who has been pretty solid coming out of the pen so far, coughed up two runs by walking Jason Kendall and Mike Cameron.
Ron Villone then served up a tater to Prince Fielder in the bottom of the 8th and it was a new game.
Enter Eric Gagne to pitch the 9th. Two singles and an intentional walk loaded the bases for Ryan Ludwick and he produced with a 2-Run single to bring home the winner.
May 1th – St. Louis 3 Milwaukee 5
Jeff Suppan did nothing to improve his season WHIP and the Cardinals continued their season long issue of not getting the big hit when needed with runners on base and runners in scoring position.
Braden Looper could not figure out Ryan Braun and his pink bat (hey, now, that is not what I meant (not that there is anything wrong with that, right Jerry Seinfield?,!) It was in support of the Susan G Koman foundation and the fight against breast cancer.)
And, in addition to not coming up with the big hit, the Cardinals also ran themselves out of a number of base runners, with El Hombre being the biggest offender.
That should have been OK, since the Cardinals would be facing Dave Bush the next with their Ace on the mound in Adam Wainwright. Garnering a split of the series would have meant a .500 road trip and kept them a game above .500 on the road for the season. However………..
May 12th – St. Louis 3 Milwaukee 8
Adam Wainwright took about his ‘ C’ game to the mound at Miller Park and got pounced on, primarily by that guy again, Ryan Braun. Nothing about this game was Cardinal friendly, except for Rick Ankiel’s home run in the first inning.
Other items of note in this clunker:
- Troy Glaus walked three times
- Cesar Izturis had two hits (hey, I said it was a clunker)
- Albert Pujols did not play
- And the grand-daddy of them all was Yadi Molina’s blow up at home plate umpire Paul Schrieber.
