ST. LOUIS CARDINALS @ CINCINNATI REDS
Baseball : United States : MLB Regular Season
Monday, August 9th 2010 - Start 7:10PM ET
(12:10AM GMT)

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ST. LOUIS CARDINALS
(61-49 W/L, 23-31 Road, 6-4 L10, L1 Streak)

The Cards have won 7 of the 12 meetings with Cincy this year, and will open this 3 game series by sending their ace to the mound, Chris Carpenter.

Carpenter is 3-0 with a 1.64 ERA since the All Star break in 5 starts, and yes, the Cards won all 5 of those games. He is also 12-3 with a 2.91 ERA for the season - that is 24 starts, with the Cards winning 18.

On head to head against the Reds, Carpenter has a scarily good record, winning 8 consecutive starts with a 1.09 ERA! That last stat includes 3 wins already this year.

CINCINNATI REDS
(64-48 W/L, 33-23 Home, 8-2 L10, W4 Streak)

The Reds have won 4 straight games and 9 of their last 11, pummelling their opponents on offence to the tune of 70-33! Thanks to that, and the fact that the Reds are at home, the price on a Cardinals win is still very good value.

The Reds will place the ball in the hands of rookie Mike Leake, who is 7-3 with a 3.86 ERA in 20 starts, with the team going 11-9 in those games.

Looks a bit of a 50-50 thing, but here's the good bit: While Leake owned a 1.95 ERA through his first 11 starts of the year, he has allowed 4 or more earned runs in 6 of his last 9 starts, sending his ERA in the last 9 games to 7.53!!

Not the kind of current form you want going up against the dangerous Cardinals batters.

BETTING VERDICT

Cincy lead the Cards by 2 games in the NL Central and the two sides have actually swapped the 1st and 2nd positions on that race almost 20 times in the last 3 months.

There isn't much to separate these two but with such a monstrous difference in the quality of pitchers, I'm going with the visitors.

The Pick :

Cardinals to win!

FIXED ODDS BETTING :

Take the St. Louis Cardinals @ 1.75 (Pinnacle) - MAIN BET