St. Louis Cardinals at Los Angeles Dodgers

Yoshinobu Yamamoto (12-8, 2.56 ERA) draws the ball for Los Angeles, and on paper this is exactly the kind of start that's supposed to cool a hot lineup down. His last time out against the Braves he went 6.1 innings with 8 strikeouts and just 1 earned run and still walked away with a loss — a start that says more about the Dodgers' offense than his stuff. St. Louis hasn't named a starter for this one, so there's no easy read yet on who's trying to slow that Cardinals lineup back down.

Brycen Mautz

(0-1)·7.94 ERA

2026 · No starts yet

ND

—IP

—ER

—K

—BB

—P

09/02 Lineup

Yoshinobu Yamamoto

(14-8)·2.51 ERA

Aug 27 @ Braves

L

6.1IP

1ER

8K

1BB

105P

09/02 Lineup

The bigger story for Los Angeles right now is who isn't available to bail Yamamoto out. Edwin Diaz is still working back from neck inflammation and Blake Treinen remains out as the Dodgers wait on his return, which leaves manager Dave Roberts thinner in high-leverage innings than a first-place club wants to be in September. St. Louis, for its part, is dealing with its own attrition up the middle — Masyn Winn and JJ Wetherholt are both out, with Wetherholt getting a cortisone shot this week for wrist tendinitis.

None of that stopped the Cardinals from putting a beating on the Dodgers' pitching staff the last time these two saw each other. Whether that carries over with a lineup already missing three regulars is the whole question here, and it's one the number doesn't fully answer yet.

St. Louis Cardinals

(69-70)

09/01W@Dodgers13-8

08/30LvsPirates4-5

08/29LvsPirates2-6

08/28WvsPirates4-1

08/27WvsOrioles7-5

Los Angeles Dodgers

(82-56)

09/01LvsCardinals8-13

08/30W@Tigers6-1

08/29L@Tigers1-2

08/28W@Tigers2-1

08/27L@Braves0-1

Los Angeles still owns the better team by a wide margin — the Dodgers sit at 82-56 to St. Louis's 69-70, and that gap is real. But form is form: LA has dropped its last game and split its last five, while the Cardinals have won 3 of their last 5 and are coming off that eruption at Dodger Stadium. A club playing out the string with nothing to lose is a different animal than one trying to hold serve atop a division.

Add it up and you've got a clearly superior roster favored at home against a scrappier, banged-up team that just proved it can do damage against this pitching staff. That tension is basically the whole game.