Comments on Memories Of Kevin Malone: Matching Up With The Cardinals: Pitching

:o

2009-10-06T22:54:44.092-10:00

telciram- If we lose 1 and 2, and it's Padilla in ...

2009-10-06T19:33:38.276-10:00

telciram- If we lose 1 and 2, and it's Padilla in 3, the chances are there won't be a 4.

telciram-That's not necessarily true.

2009-10-06T16:57:51.523-10:00

telciram-That's not necessarily true.

"Let's put it simply, if we were to lose 1 and 2, ...

2009-10-06T13:54:02.389-10:00

"Let's put it simply, if we were to lose 1 and 2, do we really want Padilla in 3?"

Either way, he'd still end up starting game 4. Either way he'll get a start.

Let's put it simply, if we were to lose 1 and 2, d...

2009-10-06T13:08:40.586-10:00

Let's put it simply, if we were to lose 1 and 2, do we really want Padilla in 3?

Brandon-Yeah, I think people forget that Wainwrigh...

2009-10-06T12:25:23.815-10:00

Brandon-Yeah, I think people forget that Wainwright against Kershaw isn't a mismatch. The Dodgers have a decent chance of getting 1 of the 2.

Penos-The thing i'm worried about is the Dodgers offense scoring runs. :o

telciram-Yes, bullpen is important, but the Dodgers hitters have to work the count.

Bayareadfan-Yup, less than a run per game.

Regular season head-to-head matchups always mean nothing.

Barnut-Basically, yes.

I would say it comes down to the Dodgers have more...

2009-10-06T06:26:22.692-10:00

I would say it comes down to the Dodgers have more depth as a club and Cards have more quality in the starting rotation. Its probably a draw.

The series will come down to how well the bats are swung.

If you take the difference in ERA between Wolf and...

2009-10-05T23:30:32.344-10:00

If you take the difference in ERA between Wolf and Carpenter and factor it in over 6-7 innings that they will possibly pitch, it amounts to less than a run.

It's an advantage to the Cards, but not a an insurmountable one. If the Dodgers somehow win game 1, the Cards will be in trouble (just as is the case in reverse). The key for us is to neutralize Carpenter as much as possible...beat him if you can otherwise match him run for run and get to the pen. We actually almost did that when we had Haeger go up against him.

Also, for all the hype of Carpenter and Wainwright, what is forgotten is that if those 2 are not pitching for the Cards, the advantage in pitching goes to the Dodgers, as we did lead the majors in team ERA. The Cards will want to have them pitching as many innings as possible, of course, and we will want the opposite.

Too many superficial analyses throw the series to the Cards just because of their top 2 pitchers, but if our pitchers hold the Cards offense down, that advantage is totally neutralized...and that's exactly what we did when they came to DS in August.

Make no mistake, the Cards 5-2 advantage in the regular season means absolutely, positively nothing (sorry legions of Cards fans who hold on to this fact as if it means something...it doesn't). 7 games is a very small sample size, then you have decades of history that show the regular season has no correlation to the playoffs whatsoever.

Going to be a good series, we can only hope (as I firmly believe) that our problems from the last 10 games were mainly due to fatigue, a poorly timed East Coast road trip, and just plain nerves...notice how on Saturday once we scored the first run, the floodgates just opened up? I don't think that's a coincidence. The Cards have an advantage in game 1, but it's not huge.

I think the fact that we've already faced Carpenter and Wainwright twice this season helps us....also notice how we improved against them the 2nd time we saw them. The Phils, OTOH, haven't even faced them at all IIRC, they got the ass end of the Cards rotation the both times they faced them and only played 5 times.

What people forget about the series is that it's n...

2009-10-05T21:25:03.353-10:00

What people forget about the series is that it's not Carpenter/wolf and Wainwright/Kershaw,

It's Carpenter with his bullpen vs the dodger offense as compared to wolf and his bullpen vs the cardinal offense.

We have edges in the bullpen and offense, that, IMO, negates the SP advantage.

I'm not too worried about the Dodger pitching. As ...

2009-10-05T20:10:08.835-10:00

I'm not too worried about the Dodger pitching. As good as Carpenter and Wainwright are, I think Wolf and Kershaw could go toe to toe with them. Yes, Piniero has been a huge surprise this year, but Vicente Padilla has been a pleasant surprise in since joining the Dodgers. Watching Padilla work yesterday was very encouraging. His curveball was breaking beautifully. I know a lot of Dodger fans would like to see Chad Billingsley take the mound for game three, but I think Torre needs to ride the hot hand, and right now Padilla is that hot hand. If a fourth starter is needed(I don't think Torre will need a fourth starter) then he can go to Bills.

I think this series is very winnable as long as the offense shows up. The offense in the last two games of the season was promising, and I hope to see that same fire in ther playoffs.

Good points. Winning both games against Carpenter...

2009-10-05T19:37:48.711-10:00

Good points.

Winning both games against Carpenter and Wainwright will be tough. However, it's certainly not the impossible task it's being made out to be.