There are not a ton of great match-ups today, but the Cardinals face off against Johan Santana today, so we will go with that. The Metropolitan's season may be a lost cause but St. Louis is certainly in the thick of it, thanks a bunch to Joel Pineiro.
Cardinals (58-50) @ Mets (50-55), 7:10pm
STL: Joel Pineiro (30, RHP, 9-9, 2.84)
NYM: Johan Santana (30, LHP, 12-8, 2.96)
A couple of decent match-ups today, like say, Zach Duke versus Matt Cain, but I am going to dip back into the Dodgers at Cardinals well.
Dodgers (62-38) @ Cardinals (55-48), 8:15pm
LAD: Clayton Kershaw (21, LHP, 8-5, 2.96)
STL: Joel Pineiro (30, RHP, 9-9, 2.95)
C.C. Sabathia is on the mound today for the Yankees versus Scott Kazmir (what ever happened to that guy?). Mark Buerhrle fresh of his perfect game, draws Scott Baker and the Twins, and you never know what you are going to get from Baker, good, great, or bad. Jair Jurrjens versus Ricky Nolasco, Cole Hamels versus Dan Haren. Heck we have a number of solid match-ups today. But Billingsley versus Adam Wainright stands out the the best of the bunch to me. What say you?
Dodgers (62-37) @ Cardinals (54-48), 8:15pm
LAD: Chad Billingsley (24, RHP, 10-5, 3.72)
STL: Adam Wainwright (27, RHP, 11-6, 2.95)
The problem here being, that most of the Holliday owners probably overpaid for him in the first place ..
Three games into the Matt Holliday era in St. Louis, things are looking great for his fantasy owners. He's 7-for-11 batting behind Albert Pujols with two runs and three RBIs to his credit thus far. While this acquisition will almost assuredly be a rental for St. Louis, he provides a ton of needed offense that will have the Cardinals competing for the NL crown. Needless to say, he was the best possible option for NL-only leaguers holding on to that #1 waiver priority.Some probably thought playing half his games in Oakland was sapping Holliday's power, but he actually hit seven of his 11 HRs this season in the Coliseum. We thought playing in Oakland was going to reduce Holliday to falling short of a 20-20 season, but this new move should give him the opportunity to put up some great stats the rest of the way. He could easily net 10-15 HRs and 10+ SBs in 200 ABs from this point on, numbers that would put him close to last year's stats. You probably won't be able to wrestle Holliday from his owner, so all I can say is good job to those of you that stuck with him and didn't put him on the market when things were bad.
11:39am: Derrick Goold of the Post-Dispatch says there's been no talk of an extension for Holliday. As Tim asks on MLBTR's Twitter, "when has a Boras client foregone free agency two months out to take a discount?"
11:16am: ESPN.com's Buster Olney reports that the deal is complete. The A's will contribute $1.5MM to the remainder of Holliday's salary, which leaves the Cards with about $4.5MM.
11:11am: Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Post Dispatch says the teams are reviewing the players' medical records. The deal will go through unless they encounter an unexpected medical issue.
read more »MLB.com's report makes it official: The trade sending Matt Holliday to St. Louis for prospects Brett Wallace, Shane Peterson, and Clayton Mortensen is a done deal.
Boy the Red Sox were busy yesterday. I missed this one. Well I saw it as I was leaving in the afternoon, but I didn't post it for ya all. I know I know, how could you go about your day without hearing about the most recent Sox transactions, right?
The move was predicated on Lugo clearing waivers, which he did this afternoon. I just wrote about Lugo, saying he was essentially a league average bat with some glove issues at shortstop. Boston is paying for the rest of Lugo’s deal, so St. Louis is receiving a virtually free reserve middle infielder and one superior to Tyler Greene at that.read more »Chris Duncan is the son of Cardinals pitching coach Dave Duncan. As you can imagine, Pops reportedly wasn’t too thrilled, nor was manager Tony LaRussa. Whether the pair threatened to quit or not is anyone’s guess, but the situation in St. Louis seems rather unpleasant at this point.
One hit this month? I'd be pissed too.
Duringa pointed defense of struggling outfielder Chris Duncan, Cardinals manager Tony La Russa said Duncan has been subjected to unfair amounts of criticism as he searches for a way to right his season.
"I get so tired of the unfair treatment of Chris Duncan," La Russa said, directing his comments to vocal fans he believes have a "blind spot" when it comes to the outfielder. "Chris is the whipping boy. ... It makes we want to vomit." "There are several guys struggling right now," La Russa said. "(Rick) Ankiel is struggling. Colby (Rasmus) is struggling. And Chris is struggling. You don't want to make it sound like it's just Chris."
Duncan has one hit this month, and in his previous 31 at-bats he has 13 strikeouts, offset slightly by nine walks. Duncan said he is getting "flooded with offspeed pitches" and is working to adjust. Asked if Duncan's numbers are somehow out of synch with the hitter he sees, La Russa said he considers Duncan "an impactful player even now." "This guy is treated unfairly," La Russa said. "These fans have a reputation ... they deserve, but they have a couple quirks. And he is one of them."
We have a couple of great National League match-ups today.
Both the Giants and Braves are fighting for their bid at the National League's Wild Card, and today we'll get the Freak versus Jair Jurrjens. Call me crazy, but I think Jurrjens takes this one. Why? Well not because he is the better pitcher, but because Jurrjens has faced better competition recently, (Boston twice, Philly, Chicago, and @Coors) and the San Fransisco bats will be no match for his talents.
You have about a one in five chance of correctly predicting the winner in the National League Central. Carpenter and Oswalt look to change those odds today. Should be a fun matchup, no?
Giants (50-43) @ Braves (48-46), 7:00pm
SFG: Tim Lincecum (25, RHP, 10-2, 2.27)
ATL: Jair Jurrjens (23, RHP, 8-7, 2.77)
Cardinals (51-45) @ Astros (48-46), 8:05pm
STL: Chris Carpenter (34, RHP, 8-3, 2.26)
HOU: Roy Oswalt (31, RHP, 6-4, 3.65)
Solid offering from Timmy.
I'd like to think that everybody is pulling for Albert Pujols to get the triple. Is there anybody out there, other than Brad Lidge or Chris Young, that does not like the machine?
Pujols is up against history and the odds during the second half of the season. But he leads his league in average, home runs and RBIs since the 2008 All-Star break and is the fourth player, joining Aaron (1957), Tony Perez (1970) and Bonds (1993), to lead from break to break since Mantle's Triple Crown year in 1956. Now comes the hard part for Pujols -- leading from April until October. But for Pujols, who is behind in the batting race by 12 points as of Sunday's games, his task is even more formidable given that he's trailing a great hitter, Hanley Ramirez.But Pujols has a shot to win the Triple Crown. Very few hitters in history have had that.
LaRussa's ten sided dice.
The way it was supposed to work for the Cardinals' lineup, against righthanded pitchers at least, was that the left fielder — on most days either lefthanded-hitting Chris Duncan or lefthanded-batting Rick Ankiel — would bat fifth after righthanded batters Albert Pujols and Ryan Ludwick and ahead of Yadier Molina, also righthanded.But with Duncan going one for his last 30 and Ankiel two for his last 32, the system isn't working the way it was designed as Duncan has dipped to .228 and Ankiel to .213. As the Cardinals prepare for the start of a three-game series in Houston tonight, manager Tony La Russa's options are varied, but not plentiful.
