When manager Mike Matheny and his defending World Champion Saint Louis Cardinals began the current three game series against Pedro Alvarez and his second-place Pittsburgh Pirates on Friday night, it was the beginning of a ten game home stand inside Busch Stadium to wrap up the first half of the season.
After losing the first two games to the Pirates--including yesterdays 7-to-3 loss due in large part to Alvarez' first-inning grand slam, Saint Louis fell to 40-38 overall for the season, and fell to three games behind the first place Cincinnati Reds.
The Pirates however, have won four in a row now and have managed to put themselves just one game out of the division lead behind the Reds, and will have Erik Bedard on the mound later this afternoon when they try to go for the sweep at 1:15 pm Central Time.
With both the All-Star Break and the trading deadline fastly approaching us, this homestand is about as big as it gets so far in this 2012 season--a good stretch puts the team in position to believe yet another division title is theres for the taking--while a poor stretch sets the teams plans back, atleast for the time being.
After finishing up the three game set this afternoon, the Cardinals will be hosting the National League West's Colorado Rockies for four games starting on Monday night--and will then end the home stand up with three games over the weekend with once again, the Miami Marlins.
Although I have stated how big the home stand certainly is--even though it is just now July, it means a lot confidence wise--it doesn't mean that it would wrap the Central up, but also as we learned last season from this same organization, it wouldn't spell disaster from a poor stretch, either.
Matheny has done an above average job so far in my opinion in his first season as the skipper, but you can also tell he still has a lot of work to do--but then again, now that the team is finally beginning to get healthy and at one-hundred percent, his job will get a little easier.
Even with the team being set back by injuries from guys that play big roles in this offense such as Matt Holliday, Lance Berkman, Skip Schumaker, Matt Carpenter, Carlos Beltran and countless others, the teams offense has still managed to be fifth in the league in runs with 390, second in batting average at .274, and ninth in home runs with ninety, it certainly shows that they can compete--and for that matter, when completely healthy with the bats, are still one of the best.
Despite the bullpen being a little rough at times this season, especially as of recent, getting some help at the position is definitely going to be a top priority come trade deadline time, and could be a key factor. Jason Motte is starting to look like he is regaining last seasons form very slowly in my eyes--but slowly or not, hes striding towards it--and up to this point, he currently has sixteen saves.
The starting pitching has been pretty stellar for the most part--and the best news yet is that ace pitcher Chris Carpenter is finally getting closer to facing live batters for the first time in over a year since shoulder surgery. Getting him back at any point and time close to playoff time and in contention could change everybodys outlook on this team the very second he steps a foot onto that mound.
The pitching staff is eighteenth overall in earned-run average at 4.07 at the moment, but on the brighter side of it, Carpenter has yet to pitch and Adam Wainwright just now seems to be hitting his stride--and he will catch mad fire sooner or later, thats an absolute fact. Lance Lynn has probably been the best starter for the team through this point--and despite his rough start on Saturday he still leads the team with an overall record on the mound of 10-4. Kyle Lohse has seven wins at the moment while both Wainwright and Jake Westbrook have six wins apiece. Jaime Garcia, who could be sidelined for another two months due to tears in his throwing shoulder, has three wins on the season.
Basically, the ten game home-stand that the defending champion Cardinals are currently involved in isn't make or break for the journey of back-to-back World Championships--but if they would like to turn some more heads heading into the All-Star Break, and get the momentum in there own favor, these games certainly do mean an awful heck of a lot.
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