Pittsburgh Pirates vs. St. Louis Cardinals – 9/17/20 MLB Pick, Odds, and Prediction

The St. Louis Cardinals and the Pittsburgh Pirates meet in an NL Central division matchup from PNC Park on Thursday.

The St. Louis Cardinals will look to rebound after having to settle for a split in their double-header with the Brewers on Sunday, taking the first game 4-2 before dropping the second half of the double dip 6-0. Game one saw Tyler O’Neill lead the charge with a home run and two RBIs while Brad Miller went 2 for 3 with a home run and a double and Tommy Edman added a double and an RBI as well to finish off the scoring for the Cardinals in the win. Adam Wainwright threw a “complete game,” giving up two runs on four hits while striking out nine over seven innings. Game two saw just Edman and Paul DeJong each record a base hit as the Cardinals were held to just two hits as a team in the shutout loss. Johan Oviedo took the loss on the mound after allowing five earned runs on seven hits while striking out five over 5.1 innings. Dakota Hudson will start here and is 3-2 with a 2.92 ERA and 31 strikeouts this season. In his career, Hudson is 2-1 with a 4.21 ERA and 14 strikeouts against Pittsburgh.

The Pittsburgh Pirates will look to rebound after a 1-0 loss to the Cincinnati Reds in their last outing. Kevin Newman, Ke’Bryan Hayes and Josh Bell each had a base hit as the Pirates mustered up just three hits as a team in the losing effort with the rest of the lineup batting 0 for 20 with 8 strikeouts. JT Brubaker took the loss after allowing the game’s lone run on five hits while striking out four over 5.1 innings of work. Steven Brault will start here and is 0-3 with a 5.06 ERA and 24 strikeouts this season. In his career, Brault is 0-2 with a 5.97 ERA and 28 strikeouts against St. Louis.

St. Louis is 2-5 in their last 7 games within the division and 1-4 in their last 5 series-opening games while the over is 4-0-1 in their last 5 games as a favorite. Pittsburgh is 18-44 in their last 62 games overall and 0-6 in their last 6 games against a team with a losing record while the under is 4-0 in their last 4 series opening games. St. Louis is 12-4 in the last 16 meetings between these two teams and 10-1 in the last 11 meetings between these two teams in Pittsburgh.

It’s hard to project what we’re going to see as far as hitting the total goes because both pitchers have given up a fair share of runs at times this season, but I’m leaning towards the under here. St. Louis’ offense could be sluggish after a double-header on Wednesday and the Pirates are just struggling to score in general, so I’ll side with the under as my free pick for this game but my stronger play is on the total and I have that available as a premium pick that you can find here.