MLB Betting Free Picks: Milwaukee @ St. Louis
Added on Jul 01, 2010 by Jack Thurman in
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Sportsbooks offering a short slate of baseball betting opportunities for Thursday, but we’ll take a look at a National League Central game between the St. Louis Cardinals and Milwaukee Brewers. Cards have been in a neck and neck race for the division lead with the Cincinnati Reds for most of the season, while Milwaukee is well off the pace 8.5 games out of first place.
Milwaukee Brewers (Wolf) at St. Louis Cardinals (Hawksworth)
July 1, 5:15 PM Pacific
Randy Wolf gets the start for Milwaukee here, and he’s been something of a disappointment in his first season in a Brewers’ uniform. He’s got a 5-7 record with a 4.92 ERA and is on track for the lowest strikeout to walks ratio of his career. He’s not the kind of pitcher that dominates opponents, but one that teams depend on for turning in ‘quality innings’. That’s very important in Milwaukee’s case since their bullpen has been awful this season. The Brewers pitching staff ranks 14th in the National League with a 4.90 team ERA, and their bullpen checks in with an ERA of 5.53.
The Cards’ Blake Hawksworth is usually a middle reliever, but looked very good in a spot start against Kansas City last weekend. Hawksworth allowed 2 hits and 1 earned run on just 66 pitches against the Royals and St. Louis is hoping that he can reprise that performance here. Interestingly, despite the Cards success in recent years–and the Brewers relative lack of it–Milwaukee has dominated the head to head play in St. Louis winning 14 of the last 21 matchups though the Cards have won two of the three meetings this year. Milwaukee has been playing good ball of late (winning 7 of their last 10) but its hard to pass up such a low price on St. Louis. Top to bottom, they’re the superior team.
Bet St. Louis (Hawksworth) -130 over Milwaukee (Wolf)
