Friday, July 24 puts two sliding teams in the same building, and only one of them has a rotation it can trust right now.
Bush’s Picks
CINSTL
CINSTL
OverUnder
Best BetCardinals
The Cardinals are the better team on paper right now, and Lowder's last outing — 8 earned runs in 2.1 innings — makes it hard to back Cincinnati regardless of who St. Louis trots out. St. Louis's record and the presence of a handful of hot bats gives it the cleaner path to a win here.
−Rotation gutted: Lodolo, Williamson, Ashcraft all out
Cardinals
+Better record at 51-48, a game off Wild Card
+Wetherholt, Herrera, Burleson, Walker producing at high level
−Lost 4 of last 5, offense ranks 15th in runs
−Blew historic 7-0 lead in extra-inning loss last week
Rhett Lowder (3-7, 5.75 ERA) takes the ball for Cincinnati coming off arguably his ugliest start of the year — Colorado tagged him for 8 earned runs on 11 hits in just 2.1 innings his last time out. St. Louis hasn't announced a starter for Friday's series opener at Busch Stadium, first pitch 7:15 PM CT.
Lowder's implosion is the symptom, not the disease. Nick Lodolo, Brandon Williamson and Graham Ashcraft are all on the injured list for Cincinnati, and Tony Santillan is out of the bullpen mix with an oblique issue too, so a shaky Lowder start doesn't have much of a safety net behind it. St. Louis has its own bullpen hole with JoJo Romero (appendicitis) not expected back when first eligible, but the Cardinals' bigger problem lately has been runs, not pitching depth.
Show fees
7:15 PM CT
Spread
ML
Total
CIN Reds
STL Cardinals
That offensive funk is the real story in St. Louis right now. The Cardinals blew a 7-0 lead in a 10-inning loss to Arizona last week — the first time they'd dropped a game after leading by 7-plus runs since 2010 — and they're one game out of a Wild Card spot despite it, which tells you how bunched up the NL race is.
Cincinnati Reds
(0)
Fully healthy — no injuries on ESPN's report
St. Louis Cardinals
(0)
Fully healthy — no injuries on ESPN's report
Injury report — info via ESPN.
Cincinnati's answer to its own attrition has been shuffling bodies — Spencer Steer has played all over the diamond for Terry Francona, including a stint in center field, and he's still day-to-day after getting hit in the ribs Monday against Seattle. Matt McLain and Blake Dunn remain out, which means more lineup improvisation from a manager who's already run out 30 different lineups in his first 30 games.
Cincinnati Reds
Jul 22?@ Mariners—
Jul 21?@ Mariners—
St. Louis Cardinals
Jul 23?vs Diamondbacks—
Jul 22?@ Angels—
Jul 21?@ Angels—
Recent form.
Neither club looks like it's playing its best baseball heading into the weekend, but St. Louis still has the better record and more established bats — JJ Wetherholt, Iván Herrera, Alec Burleson and Jordan Walker have all been productive even while the rest of the lineup stalls. Cincinnati needs length from somewhere in this rotation before the season slips away, and Friday isn't an obvious place to find it.
