For the second week in a row, the St Louis Cardinals get an outing on Five.  After losing 5-4 to the Phillies last Sunday, the Cards will be hoping for a more favourable result against their NL Central rivals tonight.  Five’s coverage begins at 00.35, allowing Jonny and Josh half an hour to discuss the latest MLB news and to preview the game before first pitch at 01.05. 

The series so far

Tonight’s game is the rubber match of a three-game series from Wrigley Field. The Cubs opened the important series with a 3-2 extra-innings victory on Friday. Jim Edmonds was the star of the show, belting two solo shots against his former team to take his season tally to fifteen.  Not bad for a guy who was considered washed-up back in April.  Both teams received strong outings from their starting pitcher (Braden Looper and Ted Lilly respectively), but it was the St Louis bullpen that ultimately cracked in the eleventh inning, as Henry Blanco hit a game-winning single off Ryan Franklin to drive home Derrek Lee.

The Cardinals got their revenge yesterday with a 12-3 win, in which St Louis pummelled the Cubs’ ace Carlos Zambrano for nine earned runs in just 4.1 innings.  Zambrano’s day was dominated by home runs: the pitcher swatted his third four-bagger of the season, but was taken deep four times including two long flies by Troy Glaus.

The Cardinals enter the finale six games behind the division-leading Cubs in the NL Central.  Chicago has a four-game lead over the Milwaukee Brewers at time of writing, although a victory for the Brew Crew over the Nationals in their afternoon game today would cut that down to 3.5 by the time the Cubs take the field.

Starting pitchers

Cardinals fans will be delighted to see Chris Carpenter back on the mound tonight.  The NL Cy Young winner from 2005 has had a desperate time since helping the Red Birds to a World Series championship back in 2006.  Carpenter pitched just six innings in the opening game of the 2007 season before heading to the DL with an injury to his right elbow.  He eventually underwent Tommy John surgery and only made his Major League return on 30 July this year.  He pitched four innings against the Braves that day and followed that performance up with a very promising five-inning outing against the Dodgers last Tuesday.  The Cards will be hoping for a strong six-inning start tonight in his third game back.

Carpenter was previously known for having five solid pitches, working in a four-seam and a two-seam fastball alongside an excellent curve and a good slider and change.  In his two recent starts the velocity on his fastball has been right around his previous mark, so there’s reason to hope that he will be able to get back to his old form (or close to it) given time.

The Cubs counter with one of the surprise stories of the 2008 season.  Plenty of people second-guessed Chicago’s decision to let former closer Ryan Dempster have a shot at being a starter heading into this season.  The Cubs’ faith has been repaid handsomely with a 12-5 record and a 2.93 ERA that has put him in the conversation of potential Cy Young award winners.  With a fastball, slider, splitter and change, he has caused opposing batters plenty of problems and his record at Wrigley this season (10-2) has been outstanding. 

Things to look out for

• Ryan Dempster’s ‘glove wiggle’.  He has taken to flapping his glove during his pitching delivery, some say as an effort to keep him from ‘tipping’ his pitches (revealing to the batter what type of pitch he is about to throw).
• Red birds at Wrigley.  Just as you will see plenty of ‘Cubbies blue’ in the stands when the Cubs are on the road, expect to see a fair sprinkling of red in the stands tonight.
• The Cubs walking away with a win?  No team in the Majors has drawn more walks than the 460 amassed by the Cubs so far this season.
• The Cardinals hitting their way to happiness?  St Louis already led the National League in hits before their sixteen hit barrage yesterday.  They now have 1,151 hits on the season, second in the Majors only to the Texas Rangers (1,162) prior to today’s games.