Cards hope for boost from Carpenter in battle with Bucs

Baseball Betting Lines

07/30/2010 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - St. Louis' bats have failed the Cardinals on more than one occasion over the club's current funk. With Chris Carpenter set to take the hill tonight versus Pittsburgh, those struggles might be forgiven tonight.

Carpenter will try to win his 11th straight decision over the Pirates when the Cardinals kick-start a three-game set versus their division rival tonight at Busch Stadium.

The 35-year-old Carpenter is 11-1 with a 2.29 earned run average in his career versus the Pirates, winning 10 decisions in a row since his lone loss to the club way back on June 29, 2004. He did not factor into the decision of his lone meeting with Pittsburgh this year, a May 7 outing in which Carpenter allowed two runs over seven innings.

The right-hander is 11-3 with a 3.09 ERA overall this year and had won two straight starts before a no-decision versus the Cubs on Sunday. Carpenter allowed three runs on nine hits over seven innings of his club's extra-inning victory.

St. Louis might need its former Cy Young Award winner to be on point tonight. Since winning eight in a row from July 11-21, the Cardinals have lost five of seven and have been shut out in three of those games.

That includes yesterday's result versus the Mets. New York knuckleballer R.A. Dickey held the Cards to just four hits over 8 1/3 innings en route to handing St. Louis a 4-0 setback.

"This is different. You're not used to facing knuckleballers," said Jon Jay, who had St. Louis' lone extra-base hit with a double. "We all check out film and talk about it and stuff, but [Dickey] was on today and did a really good job."

Ryan Ludwick, Skip Schumaker and Colby Rasmus all singled for the Cardinals, who are a half-game back of Cincinnati for first place in the National League Central. Starter Blake Hawksworth went six innings, allowing four runs on seven hits.

Looking to keep St. Louis' offense in check will be Jeff Karstens, who hasn't won since June 19. The right-hander is 0-4 with a 4.72 ERA in six starts since and has dropped each of his last three outings.

Karstens has gotten just six runs of support over his three-start slide, but allowed four runs -- two earned -- on seven hits over six innings of a 9-2 setback to the Padres on Saturday. He fell to 2-6 with a 4.72 ERA on the season.

The 27-year-old has a solid 2.25 ERA and 1-1 mark in two career starts against St. Louis, which he beat on May 8 with six shutout frames in a 2-0 triumph.

Pittsburgh failed to record a three-game sweep of Colorado on Thursday, falling 9-3 in the finale. Neil Walker had a two-run homer, but Bucs starter Paul Maholm gave up eight runs and 11 hits over 5 1/3 innings.

"I just didn't do a good job in the fourth [inning] when they got their four runs," said Maholm. "They didn't take big swings, they just put the ball in play, got runners over and I wasn't able to make the pitches."

Outfielder Andrew McCutchen is day-to-day for Pittsburgh after getting scratched from Thursday's lineup due to a sore right shoulder. McCutchen missed six games with the ailment last week and aggravated it on Wednesday.

The Cardinals took two of three in Pittsburgh when the clubs met for the first time back from May 7-9. St. Louis won 10 of the 15 meetings a season ago.

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Numerous College Basketball teams take final big step to March Madness betting

So, what turned on the lock spigot? Well, after what felt like weeks of teams treading water and slipping back into the bubble muck, a bunch of them finally decided to say "to heck with parity" and won games that should put them into the Big Dance.

Disagree with some of these? Then here's the challenge. Take all of the "should be ins" and make a legit case that each should be ahead of the team that's a lock. Then find 10 more teams that also should be placed in the bracket ahead of that lock team. Not so easy, is it?

If you want more evidence that these locks should be good to go, check out what our research department dug up. Since the NCAA Tournament went to 64 teams in 1985, only six teams from a "big six" conference have had a record of 10-6 or better in conference play and not been selected: Colorado (2004) and Nebraska (1999) from the Big 12, Boston College and Seton Hall (both 2003) from the Big East, Indiana (2005) from the Big Ten and UCLA, which somehow went 12-6 in the Pac-10 in 1988 and still missed out. (Note: Five teams went 11-7 and didn't get in, the latest being last season's Stanford team, which had a brutal nonconference run.)

Yes, 10 conference wins doesn't always mean what it used to because of unbalanced schedules, but this season, it should be plenty good in all but the extreme cases (see: Iowa).

In a way, this is a welcome development, because this is a bubble watch, not a lock watch. We can finally be done with teams like Maryland and Virginia Tech and start really bearing down on at-large battles such as Syracuse-West Virginia and Appalachian State-Georgia Tech.

Interestingly, all the shifting of teams into lock status appears to be more administrative than impactful. The number of remaining available at-larges didn't change one iota. The only difference is that teams on the bubble now have a clearer idea of which team(s) they are competing with for those precious bids.

The Bubble Breakdown
CONFERENCE LOCKS SHOULD BE INS AT-LARGES TAKEN
(assuming no auto bid outlier)
ACC Betting Odds 6 0 5
Big East Betting Odds 5 0 4
Big Ten Betting Odds 2 2 3
Big 12 Betting Odds 3 0 2
Pac-10 Betting Odds 5 1 5
SEC Betting Odds 4 0 3
MVC Betting Odds 1 1 1
MWC Betting Odds 2 1 2
TOTAL 28 5 25

As always, I've tried to be as inclusive as possible while only including teams that would have a reasonable chance of at least being discussed if this were Selection Sunday. If your team's not on here, there's probably a good reason (or three) -- start with the RPI and SOS numbers and work your way down.

(Please remember, per selection committee criteria, that records displayed are Division I only. Next update: Feb. 28)

If you have a legitimate grievance, or just like talking bubble, send an e-mail. Polite ones with fact-based arguments have a much better chance of receiving a response. I apologize in advance if I can't get back to all of you.

Atlantic Coast Conference

Work left to do: Clemson, Florida State, Georgia Tech

The ACC moves to six locks as BC, Va Tech and Virginia all got their 10th ACC wins, which should be more than enough this season, and Maryland rallied past North Carolina to get the final piece the Terps needed. After that? It could end there unless FSU, Ga Tech or Clemson picks things up in a hurry.

 

Work left to do:

Clemson [19-9 (5-9), RPI: 41, SOS: 42] The Tigers are closer to locking up the collapse of the year award (in a good battle with OK State) than they are to grabbing an at-large. Clemson's been very competitive, but there's no really positive way you can spin nine losses in 11 games. They now cannot get to .500 in ACC play and still must head to Virginia Tech in the season finale (after hosting Miami). Unless the Tigers win both and/or do some serious work in the ACC tourney, they very well could be left out. There are no great nonconference wins, but ODU, App State, Miss. State, South Carolina and Georgia are all respectable W's.

Florida State [18-11 (6-9), RPI: 48, SOS: 14] The Noles got thrashed at Maryland to run their losing streak to five, but then pounded NC State at home to set the table for what likely is an elimination game at Miami. You can at least make a case for the Seminoles at 7-9 in ACC play (and some work in the ACC tourney), but 6-10 is not going to cut it. Wins at Duke and over Florida will resonate, but the computer numbers remain questionable. Beyond Florida, FSU thrashed bubble buddy Providence, but there's not a ton beyond those two games that will help. They didn't show well in big-time opportunities against Pitt and Wisconsin (before the Florida win).

Georgia Tech [18-10 (6-8), RPI: 51, SOS: 46] The Jackets beat Wake on Wednesday but couldn't get it done at UVa on Saturday, which could be a crucial loss with UNC and BC (both at home) remaining and 8-8 almost a certain need for at-large consideration. A nonconference win over Memphis helps, but the RPI and SOS are not at-large quality right now; if you combine those with a sub-.500 ACC mark, that could spell NIT for GT.

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