Belated Series Preview: St Louis Cardinals (91-71) v Los Angeles Dodgers of Los Angeles (95-67)

The Dodgers deserve to lose this series, for these three reasons Ronnie Belliard started at 2b for the first two games Randy Wolf started the opener of the series Vincente Padilla might be starting a postseason game What happened to the Dodgers pitching staff? Well, injuries and wierdness. The underrated Hiroki Kuroda missed time earlier this season after being hit in the head by a line drive (the ball bounced into the stands after hitting him in the head). He returned and pitched effectively, but is now out for the NLDS with a herniated disk in his back. The team’s erstwhile ace, Chad Billingsley, completely fell off a cliff midway through the season and is trying to work out some possible mechanical issues. Here are the team’s top players by WAR PlayerWAR Kemp5.1 Blake4.3 Kershaw4.2 Furcal3.3 Billingsley3.2 Ramirez*2.6 *Ramirez missed 50 games due to his steroid suspension. Prorating that WAR number gives a un-Mannylike 4.0 WAR. I really don’t like this team at all. They do have an incredible bullpen, but overall it’s just kind of blah. Ethier has a really good bat (he just hit a HR as I’m writing this) but I had no idea he was such a trainwreck in RF - he posted a -14.6 UZR in RF this year. Their offense was 12th in MLB (.331 wOBA), the second-best pitching staff (3.80 FIP), and 13th in defense (1.1 UZR). Given the injuries and ineffectivness in their starting staff, this team is in trouble. Here’s the Cardinals top performers PlayerWAR Pujols8.4 Wainwright5.7 Carpenter5.6 Pineiro4.8 Molina3.4 Holliday*2.8 *Holliday only has 270 PAs with the club, as he was a mid-season acquisition. Again, pro-rating this he’s a ~6 WAR player. We’re all familiar with how good this team is, so I don’t really need to say much here. I think they’re the best team in the NL. Their offense strangely ranked 19th (.325 wOBA), their pitching 3rd (3.82 FIP), and their defense is 15th in MLB (-17 UZR). The acquisitions of Holliday and DeRosa really turned this offense around though, so take those offensive numbers with a grain of salt. The Cards answer to Ryan Theriot is Brendan Ryan, who posted a 3.2 WAR this year. He’s nothing special with the bat (.324 wOBA) but he plays incredible defense (10.8 UZR/150) at SS, unlike our false-hustling pal. His moustache should be worth -5 WAR though, as far as I’m concerned. That stache is pure FAIL. Players to watch Not surprisingly, I’m going to pick the highest WAR players in Pujols and Kemp. Pujols should have his name penciled in for the NL MVP for the next few years, and they should be clearing space for his Hall of Fame plaque. Kemp has always been underrated and is finally starting to get some attention. It’s still hard to believe that he was being benched for Juan ******* Pierre from time to time and batting 8th earlier this season. Pitching Matchups Wednesday Chris Carpenter, RHP (2.78) v Randy Wolf, LHP (3.96), Dodgers win 5-3 You’d think these guys were flip-flopped, the way they performed. Carpenter didn’t have his good stuff at all last night, and the Cardinals knocked around Wolf last night too. Both offenses were Cubs-esque in getting runners in though, as they stranded 30 runners between them in the game. Thursday Adam Wainwright, RHP (3.11) v Clayton Kershaw, LHP (3.08), game tied 1-1 in the 5th Kershaw is the best pitcher remaining on this Dodgers team, unless Billingsley’s mechanical issues are somehow magically corrected. He’s a flyball pitcher that strikes out a lot of guys (9.74 K/9) but walks a bunch too (4.79 K/9). He hasn’t had a particularly large innings bump this year, but this is only his second year in the majors so if the Dodgers go further in the playoffs he might run out of gas. Saturday Chad Billingsley, RHP (3.82) v Joel Pineiro, RHP (3.27), 5:07 PM CT Vincente Padilla is officially listed as the starter for this game, but I think the Dodgers aren’t that foolish. They’ll throw Billingsley out there and if he pitches well, they’re in decent shape, and if he doesn’t, well, they’re pretty boned anyway since they’ll only have one quality pitcher in their playoff rotation (Kershaw). Sunday Vincente Padilla (?), RHP (3.40) v John Smoltz, RHP (2.73), TBA Don’t be fooled by either of these numbers - both of these guys moved to the NL fairly late in the season and aren’t this good. Tuesday Chris Carpenter, RHP (2.78) v Randy Wolf, LHP (3.96), TBA I don’t think either of these guys are good candidates to pitch on short rest in game 4. Maybe Wolf, but he’s much more likely to crap the bed again than Carpenter. If it’s an elimination game for the Cards we might see Carpenter, but I think the Cards have enough rotation depth to avoid risking pitching Carpenter on 3 days rest. Prediction Cards in 4 - the Dodgers were lucky to win game one. Why couldn’t the 2008 Cubs have faced this Dodgers team?