The Milwaukee Brewers and the St. Louis Cardinals will finish up a three-game series on Thursday night. It's time to continue our MLB odds series and make a Brewers-Cardinals prediction and pick.
The Brewers have taken the first two games of this series and will look to complete the sweep on Thursday. These wins don't mean too much to Milwaukee, as they've pretty much locked up first place in the NL Central. The Cardinals, however, need every win they can get. St. Louis is pretty much out of the running for first place in the division, but they're only four games out of a wild card spot. Every loss is hugely damaging for their postseason hopes, so expect the Cardinals to pull out all of the stops to avoid being swept here.
Here's how the bookmakers have set the lines for Thursday's game.
MLB Odds: Brewers-Cardinals Odds
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Milwaukee Brewers -1 1/2 (-120)
St. Louis Cardinals +1 1/2 (+100)
Over 8 runs (-110)
Under 8 runs (-110)
Why The Brewers Could Cover The Spread
As usual, Milwaukee has a massive pitching advantage over their opponent. The Brewers will deploy pitcher Brandon Woodruff to the mound for this series finale. Woodruff has been fantastic this season, earning a 2.18 ERA and a .90 WHIP. He's faced the Cardinals once this season already, pitching seven innings of one-run ball. There's good reason to believe that Woodruff can continue his elite pitching and put together another good performance against this poor Cardinals offense.
St. Louis ranks in the bottom ten in baseball in batting average, slugging percentage, OPS, and OBP. All of these numbers show that Woodruff has a big advantage against this lineup, but it gets even better for the Milwaukee starter when we look at the advanced stats. Woodruff only allows a barrel percentage of 4.7% and a walk percentage of 6.6%. This means that the Cardinals will hardly get any free baserunners, and that extra-base hits will be extremely difficult to come by. In order to score, this far below-average St. Louis lineup will have to string together multiple hits, which doesn't seem likely at all.
Why The Cardinals Could Cover The Spread
The Cardinals will entrust this start to pitcher Jon Lester. Lester's season-long stats are't great, but he has some encouraging numbers as he heads into this crucial matchup. Lester is a far better pitcher at home than he is on the road. The lefty's ERA is 6.15 on the road, but that plummets all the way to 4.84 whenever Lester pitches in Busch Stadium.
Lester has had a pretty rough season, but he gets to face a Brewers lineup that's far from scary in this one. He's already faced Milwaukee once this season, posting four innings of one-run baseball. The Brewers are also on a bit of a cold streak, as they've only scored more than four runs twice in their last five games. It's far from a lock, but Lester may be able to put together another good performance against the Brewers.
Final Brewers-Cardinals Prediction & Pick
Milwaukee should pull off the sweep easily in this game. Woodruff is one of the elite pitchers in the MLB, and Lester is an easy matchup for the Brewers. Milwaukee will cover the spread in this win and walk away with a sweep of the Cardinals.
FINAL PICK: Milwaukee Brewers -1 1/2 (-120)
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