If only we could get Weaver to pitch like Carpenter...

I seem to go out of town at the right times.  I spent this past weekend up in northern Spain enjoying one last weekend at the beach.  And it was wonderful. This also means that I missed most of the Arizona series.  I did return in enough time to catch the Sunday debacle of a game, if you can call it that.  I wished I would have missed it too.

But now I am home and enjoying a great series against our sort-of rival Houston.  Usually rivalries form with teams that are geographically near each other, which is not really the case with the 'Stros.  Any Cardinal fan's top hated rival would of course be the Chicago Cubs.  But with the Cubbies not looking too hot these days and not even pretending like they might think about the playoffs, that leaves us with having to form rivalries with real contenders in our division.  Due to the NLCS the last two years being with the Astros (one win for us, one for them), they have become sort of the new rival.  A good team with good pitching, that's fun to beat.

And last night we did exactly that.  Carp was masterful and upped his case for why he should be named the NL Cy Young.  You can read my last post to hear all my gushing about the Card's ace, who happens to have the best curve ball in the league.

Tonight is a somewhat different story.  Andy Pettitte (who was supposed to start last night) is instead starting tonight against Jeff Weaver.  Apparently Pettitte hurt his ankle or something like that.  That might very well be the case, but I bet Garner based his decision on more than that.  He might have figured you're going to lose the game to Carpenter anyway, so it would be better not to sacrifice the better pitcher in Pettitte in that game.  Throw Buchholz and his 5-10 record and 5+ ERA at the Cardinals instead, sacrifice one game, in hopes of beating Weaver in Game 2.

Who knows.

Then again, the way that Garner managed in the All-Star game, maybe he couldn't figure all that out and Pettitte really did injure himself in some way.

Our hope is that the bats that were hot last night will keep on swinging.

Spiezio is one of the guys swinging a very hot bat right now, basically picking up where Gary Bennett left off.  In his last 20 at-bats, he's racked up 7 hits (.350), 4 homers, 8 RBIs and scored 6 runs.

On a more depressing note, Rolen is going through a mini-slump and not even hitting .200 this month and worse yet, has gone an alarming 2 for 23.  He's a talented hitter though and I'm ready for him to break out big in one of these series these last two games against the Astros would be the perfect time to make that happen.

Series win against 'Stros,

Tiffany