Boxscore

I thought the Cardinals had this one and that the Brewers would fall to 2 games back of Chicago thanks to the Cubs earlier win. But now, I underestimated the mediocrity of Ryan Franklin.

Having watched Franklin with the Reds, you would think I would have been prepared for the homer Ryan Braun launched off him in the 9th. I guess LaRussa’s bullpen voodoo magic is wearing off.

The win was the Brewers 8th in a row and gave them the sweep of the 4-game series against St. Louis. This is the longest winning streak this century for Milwaukee, the hottest team in the Majors right now. And with pitchers like Sheets and Sabathia in the rotation, it’d be hard not to look over your shoulder if you’re a Cubbie.

The Cardinals look a little tired. At least, the pitchers do. LaRussa wants a trade, but now would be a bad time to trade away the future. Bullpen help is needed, but the best solution might be a starting pitcher who can go more than 5 innings on a regular basis. With Todd Wellemeyer and Braden Looper, the Cardinals have to use their bullpen for 8 innings every 5 days. That’s rough. If they can address that, they might hang in the race.

Boxscore

Apparently, C.C. Sabathia is rockin’ it old school. He tossed his third straight complete game yesterday to defeat the Cardinals. It’s his 6th complete game of the year and his 3rd complete game shut-out.

Sabathia’s been scary good since coming to the Brewers, and this most recent complete game was his best outing yet, as it took him only 106 pitches to clinch the series win against the Cardinals. Milwaukee has now won 7 in a row and are only 1 game behind the Cubs. This is shaping up to be one excellent race.

Boxscore

This week on the podcast, the CTS and I take the day off work to visit Victory Field where the Indianapolis Indians took on the Charlotte Knights for a business person’s special. The background noise is all AAA ball, but the subject matter is all NLC.

In addition to a minor sunburn, our seats on the third-base side gave us a great view of the Indians pitchers warming up in the bullpen.

I imagine the CTS took this photo in direct response to me giving him a hard time about taking pictures of the Reds cheerleaders at the last game we went to.

He’s safe!

You can’t beat the up-close experience of a minor league ball park.

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Boxscore

The Cardinals undoubtedly view last night’s game against the Brewers as one that they should have won. The Brewers, who won their 5th straight and moved into a tie with the Cardinals, probably wouldn’t agree.

St. Louis tied the game in the bottom of the 9th to force extras, but that didn’t last long. In the top of the 10th, Ryan Franklin, current closer for the Cardinals, did anything but close things out. Franklin allowed three runs, including a home run from Bill Hall.

The loss gives the bullpen 21 losses so far this year, which is second only to the Giants. Obviously an area that needs to improve if the team wants to continue to hang with Chicago and Milwaukee.

So the All Star break is over as of today. I, for one, enjoyed it. It’s always nice to pause and take a breath in the middle of a marathon. Get some water or Gatorade to drink, too, to replenish the fluids. Did you see that Powerade now has a zero calorie energy drink? It’s a little light, but not bad. I think it’s about time that the energy drinks got on the same caloric level as water.

But I digress.

The unofficial second half of the season starts today, and the Central’s looking much better than anyone predicted. The Cubs, Brewers, and Cardinals are all solid and looking to improve, while the Reds show promising talent but disastrously inept management. The Astros have fallen and the Pirates have a chance to improve.

So what do the bloggers of these teams think? Let’s find out.

Houston Astros

• The Crawfish Boxes sets some modest goals for the rest of the Astros season. Strangely, no choking of any kind is mentioned. Perhaps that should be the goal for the Cubs.
• Meanwhile, the Astrocast seems to be coming to grips with the teams’ suckage.

Milwaukee Brewers

• Milwaukee’s actually in a good spot for the second half, having replaced their worst starter with a recent Cy Young award winner. Still, Brew Crew Ball examines the team and thinks that there is room for improvement at second base. After his 3-error performance in the All Star game, my vote would be for Dan Uggla. Now there’s a winner!

St. Louis Cardinals

• There’s a lengthy post at Viva El Birdos (Wordy? Viva El Birdos?! Never!) arguing that the team should sign Barry Bonds to help the offense. That certainly wouldn’t bring back all the steroid-type allegations the team has faced over the past year. And we’ve seen how Rick Ankiel handles pressure.

Chicago Cubs

• After having 8 players be named All Stars, I don’t see a whole lot of trade rumors for the Cubs. Goat Riders writer Colin crunches some numbers and determines how awesome he thinks the Cubs players are. It’s nice that Cubs fans will always have that excellent first half to look back on.
• View From the Bleachers makes some fearless predictions about the Central race in the second half of the season. Strangely, he has the Cardinals choking and not the Cubs. I really can’t think of any better way to celebrate 100 years than that.

Pittsburgh Pirates

• The poor, lowly Pirates. They have a new GM this season, but so far he hasn’t done much noteworthy other than release Matt Morris. On the plus side, he’s not been fleeced in trades like his predecessor, but then he hasn’t really made any trades. Bucs Dugout picked up a quote from Huntington that indicates that might change soon.
• Pittsburgh Lumber Company looks at whether Jack Wilson should be traded. The answer is yes, yes, a million times yes.
• And Where Have You Gone Andy Van Slyke? presents some dream trades for the Pirates this year. Is there a more optimistic lot than Pirates fans? I want to see the team succeed, but after so many years of incompetent losing, I would find it hard to see a silver lining.

Cincinnati Reds

• The Reds are kind of in limbo. Everyone knows they should fire Dusty Baker if they want to actually capitalize on their talented youngsters, but there’s not much talk about it. It’s probably too depressing. The owner has hitched himself to Baker for several years, after all. Things could be turning around, though, assuming the Reds play basketball in the second half.
• And beat writer John Fay suggests the Reds should use a six-man rotation. Hey, if it’s a gimmick that sells tickets, I say go for it.