NL East Series Preview 7-6-09 to 7-9-09
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| The Philadelphia Phillies were able to get some confidence by playing the beaten up Mets this weekend at home. They swept the Mets while only allowing them to score three total runs in three games, including a shutout on Sunday afternoon. The sweep secured that the Phillies(42-37, 1st in NL East) would stay all alone in first place as they welcome in the Cincinnati Reds this week. It also appears that Jimmy Rollins has found his stroke, as he went 5/11 with three walks, five RBI and two runs scored including a leadoff homerun in Sundays’ game. If he can continue it would be a huge lift to the Phillies, as they also hope to get All-Star Raul Ibanez back this week. The Phillies will need that as well as continued solid starts from their pitchers as they got this weekend against the Mets. Phillies Phandom will have more of the Phillies news you crave.
The Cincinnati Reds(40-40, 4th in NL Central 3GB) are 6-4 in their past ten games and despite being a .500 team, are only three games back of first place in the National League Central. They had the chance over the weekend to make some noise in the division, but lost two of three to the current division leading St. Louis Cardinals, hurt by a terrible outting by Arroyo on Sunday. They will hope to stay within striking distance in this series. The probable pitching matchups are shown below: |
| Monday @ 7:05PM EST - Cueto,CIN(8-4,2.69 ERA) vs. Hamels,PHI(4-5,4.98 ERA) |
| Tuesday @ 7:05PM EST - Harang,CIN(5-8,3.86 ERA) vs. Happ,PHI(5-0,2.96 ERA) |
| Wednesday @ 7:05PM EST - Bailey,CIN(1-0,5.94 ERA) vs. Lopez,PHI(1-0,2.84 ERA) |
| Thursday @ 7:05PM EST - Owings,CIN(6-8,4.48 ERA) vs. Moyer,PHI(7-6,5.72 ERA) |
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| The Florida Marlins appear to be getting things together and they hope this isn’t another tease as their season start was. The Marlins(43-40, 2nd in NL East 1GB) won five out of six games this week and going into Friday night’s games were actually virtually tied for first. They won two out of three this weekend and dropped out of the tie, but are alone in second place and only one full game behind the Phillies. They have had some brilliant starting pitching, including the revival of Ricky Nolasco and of course the very hot bat of All-Star Hanley Ramirez leading the way. They hope to stay close or even pass the Phillies for first place by the all-star break, starting with a west coast swing in San Francisco.
The San Francisco Giants(44-37, 2nd in NL West 7.5GB) may be a whopping 7.5GB of the Dodgers a week before the All-Star break but they lead the National League wild card by 1.5 games. This comes as a surprise to many, but the pitching has been top notch for the Giants. They hope to continue that and put young Matt Cain to the mound to start the series tonight. The probable pitching matchups are below: |
| Monday @ 10:15PM EST - West,FLA(3-2,4.06 ERA) vs. Cain,SF(9-2,2.48 ERA) |
| Tuesday @ 10:15PM EST - Johnson,FLA(7-1,2.76 ERA) vs. Zito,SF(4-8,4.82 ERA) |
| Wednesday @ 3:45PM EST - Volstad,FLA(5-8,4.85 ERA) vs. Sadowski,SF(2-0,0 ERA) |
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| The Mets are reeling right now, and seeing the Dodgers with newly reinstated Manny Ramirez come to town is probably not what they want to see. The Mets(39-42, 3rd in NL East 4GB) are coming off a ten game stretch where they went 2-8 including a three game sweep at the hands of the Phillies. It seems like nothing is going right for the Mets when they had two losses given to Johan Santana this week and can barely manage any offense. They have a slew of players on the disabled list, but they will get Oliver Perez back for Wednesday nights game, although no one is sure if that is a good thing. Check The Real Dirty Mets Blog for more Mets info.
The Los Angeles Dodgers and seemingly everyone in baseball was celebrating the return of Manny Ramirez from a PED suspension. He responded with a home run in his second game back before he was given the third day off to slow him back in. The Dodgers(52-30, 1st in NL West) lead all of baseball in wins and have the largest division lead as well. The probable pitchers are shown below: |
| Tuesday @ 7:10PM EST -Kershaw,LAD(5-5,3.49 ERA) vs. Pelfrey,NYM(6-3,4.26 ERA) |
| Tuesday @ 7:10PM EST - Kuroda,LAD(3-4,3.91 ERA) vs. Perez,NYM(1-2,9.97 ERA) |
| Thursday @7:10PM EST-Wolf,LAD(3-3,3.49 ERA) vs. Hernandez,NYM(5-4,4.56 ERA) |
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| The Atlanta Braves(39-42, 3rd in NL East 4GB) entered Washington on Friday on a four game winning streak, three of which in a series sweep of the division leading Phillies and only two games back of first. They left Washington in a third place tie with the Mets and four games back of first place. Their relief pitching hurt them on Saturday and Sunday a former Marlin quieted their bats as they only started to come back in the ninth inning. They hope a trip to Chicago will heal their wounds and allow them to roll into the final weekend of the first half on a a nice streak. Check out The Braves Baseball Blog for more info on the Braves.
The Chicago Cubs(40-39, 3rd in NL Central) have recently started to play better after being a very mediocre team for much of the season. Many had them as the run away winners of the NL Central only for them to play around .500 baseball or worse for much of the year. They hope to keep having solid play from Derek Lee as they did in a four game series win versus Milwaukee last week and get closer to 1st place. The probable pitchers are below: |
| Monday @ 7:05PM EST - Jurrjens,ATL(6-6,2.73 ERA) vs. Wells,CHI(3-3,2.43 ERA) |
| Tuesday @ 8:05PM EST - Vazquez,ATL(5-7,3.05 ERA) vs. Dempster,CHI(5-5,4.09 ERA) |
| Wednesday @ 2:20PM EST - Kawakami,ATL(4-6,4.46 ERA) vs. Zambrano,CHI(4-3,3.50 ERA) |
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| Finally, the Nationals(24-55, 5th in NL East 18GB) just took two out of three from the Braves after getting swept out of Miami before that. They hope to keep riding their young, solid pitching in a tough park for a pitcher in Colorado this week. One other solid from this weekend is it appears the Nats have found a closer, with Mike MacDougal getting another two saves now for them. Adam Dunn also hit his 300th home run of his career as well as Ryan Zimmerman being named an all-star this weekend. Check out CenterfieldGate for more Nationals news.
The Colorado Rockies(42-39, 3rd in NL East 9.5GB) are already fading from the division, but are still very much in the hunt for the wild card. After winning 17 of 18 games once they changed managers, the Rockies are coming back down to earth. That streak though did help them have a much bigger chance of the offseason this year. The probable pitchers are shown below: |
| Monday @ 8:40PM EST - Stammen,WAS(1-3,5.44 ERA) vs. Marquis,COL(10-5,3.87 ERA) |
| Tuesday @ 8:40PM EST - Zimmermann,WAS(3-3,4.52 ERA) vs. Hammel,COL(5-4,3.90 ERA) |
| Wednesday @ 3:10PM EST - Detwiler,WAS(0-4,5.81 ERA) vs. De La Rosa,COL(5-7, 5.14 ERA) |
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