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NL Playoff MLB Betting Preview: Chicago Cubs

Written by on October 6, 2015

MLB News and Betting Previews| Xbet.ag
The Chicago Cubs make their return to the postseason, taking on the Pittsburgh Pirates in the National League wild card game on Wednesday. The game will take place in Pittsburgh, as the Pirates had a better regular season record than the Cubs, but most of the talk is centering on Cubs pitcher Jake Arrieta, who on Monday won his second straight pitcher of the month title. He had mowed hitters down in August, but September was just as dominant, as he went 4-0 with an infinitesimal 0.45 ERA. Opposing hitters only batted .148 against him. These numbers have made him a late competitor in the Cy Young Award, a prize that for most of the MLB betting season had seemed destined for the Dodgers’ Zack Greinke. One irony of the Cubs’ wild card status is the fact that they have the third best record in all of baseball. The Cubs have the bad luck to play in the same division as both the Pittsburgh Pirates and the St. Louis Cardinals, and the Cards won 100 games to the Cubs’ 94. However, the Cubs would have won any other division in MLB with their record, and would be headed to a Division Series instead of a one-game wild card game in Pittsburgh. While Jake Arrieta has dominated the Pirates (one run, seven hits in 15 innings in the last two starts against Pittsburgh), The Cubs have also seen their hitters elevate their play against the Pirates. Anthony Rizo is batting a sizzling .352 against Pittsburgh this year. Kris Bryant is hitting .400 – with a .494 on base percentage and a slugging percentage of .557. jake-arrieta-cubs Both the Cubs and the Pirates have been carried by their pitching this year. The Cubs have held Andrew McCutchen, the best hitter on the Pirates’ side, to a .222 average. Catcher Francisco Cervelli is the best hitter on the Pirates, and he has hit .321 against Chicago. The Cubs won 11 of the 19 games between the two teams this year, while Pittsburgh only took eight. So what happens if the Cubs win? They get the unenviable task of taking on the St. Louis Cardinals in the Division Series. The Cards have now won three straight NL Central crowns and are a formidable opponent for any team. The jam-packed NL Central has seen the two teams face off 19 times already this season, though, so the Cubs know what they are getting into. joe-maddon As for manager Joe Maddon, he is simply enjoying the experience of taking a perennial almost-ran and turning it into a playoff contender. Maddon made a name for himself in Tampa Bay, using creative techniques and an insistence on defense and pitching to lead the Rays to the 2009 World Series and making them regular factors in the American League postseason, even though the Rays bowed out to Texas in the 2010 and 2011 Division Series. In Chicago, he has a chance to help the team overcome more than a century of futility – the Cubs have not won a World Series since 1908 – and add even more glory to a stellar resume.
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