Free Baseball Bet Apr28'09: St. Louis (Lohse/R) @ Atlanta (J.J.Reyes/L)

The weakness of the line favoring the Cardinals surprises me for this game, on a number of levels.

Up front these are two teams moving in opposite directions, as the past 10 games has seen St. Louis post a 7-3 record while Atlanta has been sliding and posted a 4-6 record. In those games, the Cards have registered a slugging % of .490 while ATL has been down at .383.

Past 10	Record	Slugging%
St. Louis	7-3	.490
Atlanta	4-6	.383

St. Louis has been hitting the ball hard of late, only being slowed lately by efforts from the nasty Rich Harden and a good effort from Jair Jurrjens (after travelling to Atlanta for the first game of the series).

In regards to the pitchers, Lohse has started off the season in fine form, going 3-0 and posting a 0.96 WHIP with a 3.21 FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching statistic) over 4 starts. However, in his only start of the year, Reyes got tuned, allowing 5 ER in 5 2/3 innings with a 1.76 WHIP.

As for the all important head-to-head pitcher/hitter matchups, here is how the starters shape up:

Batters vs	OPS	AVG
Kyle Lohse vs ATL	.795	.293
Jo-Jo Reyes vs STL	1.095	.343

Albert Pujols especially has eaten Reyes for dinner, posting a 1.843 OPS in 7 AB that inclues a HR, a double and 3 BB. One of the few Braves that has had success against Lohse, Garret Anderson (with a 1.007 OPS against him in 25 AB), is presently on the DL. Another DL ridden lefty bat that could do some damage against the righty, were he available, is catcher Brian McCann - he has only contributed 1 hit in the past two weeks since encountering eye troubles, and his absence appears to be hampering the middle of the Braves order.

Bullpen-wise, the edge goes again to STL having posted a 1.24 WHIP thus far this year versus the 1.58 WHIP posted by ATL's pen.

Sure the Braves are at home for this game, but Reyes is not a pitcher that has taken advantage of his surroundings in the past; in 2008 he posted a 4.97 ERA on the road but a 6.89 ERA at home. Now that the Cards have had a chance to settle in after travelling and playing a game at Turner Field, look for their bats to come alive tonight.

Pick: Cardinals -115