Milwaukee Brewers (38-30) AT Chicago Cubs (27-39)
June 15, 2011 at 8:05 PM EST
Opening Moneyline: CHC -115, MIL -105
Current Moneyline: CHC -114, MIL -105
Opening Total: 8.5
Current Total: 8.5
SP: MIL- Chris Narveson; CHC- Carlos Zambrano
Positives have to be drawn where ever they can when a team is 12 games below .500. For the Cubs, that positive is that they have won back to back games and could win their third straight tonight. They haven’t won three straight all season.
Carlos Zambrano was anything but accepting of his teammates as they dropped 13 of 16 games and Zambrano called the Cubs’ play “embarassing.” He applogized, but an appology seems out of place given the accuracy of his statement. It’s never good to rag on teammates, but maybe they got the message. He was particuarly critical of the Cubs closer Carlos Marmol.
The funny thing is that Zambrano hasn’t been particularly impressive himself. He’s plodding along with an ERA over four (4.40) and has only won 5 of his 8 decisions. He gave up 7 runs in the loss to the Phillies on Friday and also issued seven walks, a career worst for Zambrano. “Too many walks,” he said. “You can’t do that against teams like this. Next time I will make an adjustment.”
Zambrano’s ERA has been under 4 for the past three seasons, but Baseball Prospectus predicted this drop off, as their predicted PECOTA projection for his ERA was 4.32, and his WHIP was projected to be 1.45 as well.
The Brewers will be sending Chris Narveson to the mound, who has had success against the Cubs. In his three career starts against the Cubs, he is 3-0 with a 0.98 ERA. He allowed only 6 hits in 7 innings on April 9th against the Cubs and shut them out. He lasted eight innings in Friday’s shutout win over the Cardinals.
“I think you always need an outing like this,” Narveson remarked. “It’s definitely a good feeling to be able to go out there and just go out and get back to base one and get yourself set.”
Narveson spent TEN years in the minors, so he’s not a typical rookie. His 4.99 ERA last season was deceiving as his stuff looked better than a 5 run a game pitcher would have. His fastball isn’t overwhelming, in the upper 80s, but his off-speed pitches make it more effective than it might be otherwise. His projected ERA for this season according to Baseball Prospectus is 5.51 and he has been much better than that with a 4.32 ERA. He was projected to only pitch 58 innings, but has become a crucial rotation starter who will obviously log much more than that.
Last night, the Brewers failed to hold their 3 run lead in a 10 inning loss. The Cubs received strong outings from Aramis Ramirez and Starlin Castro, who hit the game ending single, as one of his three hits.
“We made some mistakes early and didn’t do ourselves any favors,” Brewers manager Mike Quade said. “There were about a half-dozen plays and things I saw that I’m not very happy about and they damn near cost us. But they kept playing.”
Alfonso Soriano has been rehabbing a strained quadricep muscle at AAA Iowa. The Cubs may activate him today. He’s hit 12 homers this year, which leads the Cubs.
Some betting trends:
Milwaukee is 17-7 SU in their last 24 games and the total has gone OVER in 4 of their last 6 on the road. The Brewers are 4-2 SU in their last 6 on the road and they are 3-6 SU in their last 9 games against the Cubs. The Total has gone OVER in 9 of Milwaukee’s last 11 games on the road against the Cubs.
The Chicago Cubs are 4-11 SU in their last 15 games and the total has gone UNDER in 4 of their last 6 at home. The Cubs are 6-3 SU in their last 9 games against the Milwaukee Brewers and the total has gone OVER in 9 of the last 11 games at home against Milwaukee.
Zambrano is going to have to back his previous words up with a strong outing, no matter whether he apologized or not. The fact remains that he hasn’t been that good, and the Cubs have been horrible. Milwaukee was shut out in the opener and managed 4 runs last night, so they will have to improve on that statistic of 2 runs per game to give Narveson ample run support to pick up the win.
