Cincinnati Reds (74-67) vs. St. Louis Cardinals (71-68)
September 10, 2021 8:15 pm EDT
The Line: St. Louis Cardinals -105 / Cincinnati Reds -125; Over/Under: 8
(Get latest betting odds)
The Cincinnati Reds and the St. Louis Cardinals meet in MLB action from Busch Stadium on Friday night.
The Cincinnati Reds will look to rebound from a 4-1 loss at the hands of the Chicago Cubs in their last game. Joey Votto had a solo home run to make up the lone piece of scoring the Reds would do in the losing effort. Jonathan India had a pair of hits with a double while Max Schrock, Kyle Farmer and Tyler Naquin each had a base hit to round out the offense as Cincinnati had just six hits as a team in the losing effort. Vladimir Gutierrez gave up one run on two hits while striking out six over five innings of work, not factoring in the decision. Brad Brach took the loss in relief to fall to 1-2 on the year as a result. Tyler Mahle will start here and is 11-5 with a 3.76 ERA and 182 strikeouts this season.
The St. Louis Cardinals will look to build off of their 2-1 win over the Dodgers from Thursday. Tyler O’Neill had a solo home run while Andrew Knizner had two hits with a double and an RBI to make up the scoring for the Cardinals in the winning effort. Dylan Carlson had a double while Paul Goldschmidt had a base hit of his own to make up the rest of the Cardinals’ offense in the victory. Jake Woodford threw four innings, giving up one run on three hits while striking out three, not factoring in the decision after four innings. Alex Reyes got the win in relief to improve to 6-8 while Geovanny Gallegos closed the 9th for his 6th save. Jon Lester will start here and is 5-6 with a 4.89 ERA and 70 strikeouts this season.
Cincinnati is 23-8 in their last 31 Friday games and 3-8 in their last 11 games overall while the under is 8-0 in their last 8 games as a road favorite. St. Louis is 5-1 in their last 6 Friday games and 2-5 in their last 7 series-opening matchups while the ver is 4-1 in their last 5 division games.
Well out of nowhere, this matchup has become extremely high-stakes, as St. Louis is on Cincinnati’s heels in the wild card race. Tyler Mahle’s been good on the road and while I’m not a Jon Lester fan by any means, he’s pitched capably as of late. I think both teams know a lot is on the line here, so give me the under in this spot.
