One of the biggest series of the season is on the horizon, as the Brewers head to St. Louis for a three-game set against the rival Cardinals this weekend.
With just over a month and a half of baseball left, the Brewers and Cardinals remain neck and neck in the race for the National League Central crown.
Here is a preview of the Crew’s crucial weekend series in St. Louis.
Two Hot Hitting Teams
Since the All-Star Break, the Brewers and Cardinals have been two of the most productive offenses in baseball.
During this stretch, the Brewers rank third in MLB in OPS at .834. While the Cardinals sit just a few points below them at .803.
Winners of seven out of their last eight games, St. Louis has been driven by a National League MVP candidate, Paul Goldschmidt, and the reigning National League Player of the week, Nolan Arenado. The latter blasted three homers while slashing .476/.560/1.000 last week.
The Brewers will look to a former Cardinal Kolten Wong to continue his recent tear. Since the All-Star Break, Wong has collected a .375 batting average to go along with 13 runs scored.
Premier Pitching Matchup
As both teams come into the series performing well offensively, they’ll have to keep it up against some of the best arms in each of their rotations.
St. Louis will start Jordan Montgomery, Adam Wainwright and Miles Mikolas on the mound this weekend. All three enter the series with sub-4 ERAs, with Wainwright topping the rotation in both ERA (3.42) and strikeouts (108).
Meanwhile, the Crew turns to Eric Lauer, Corbin Burnes and Aaron Ashby against the Cardinals, setting up Saturday’s game as a premier pitching battle between Burnes and Wainwright.
The reigning Cy Young Award winner has taken his game to another level when facing the Cardinals this season. In two starts against St. Louis, the reigning National League Cy Young Award Winner has collected ten or more strikeouts in both outings while not allowing a single earned run.
Can the Crew Take Control of the Central?
The Brewers and Cardinals enter the final stretch of the season where they’ve been all year: in the midst of a heated race for first place.
Entering Thursday night, the two squads are separated by half a game in the National League Central.
There’s not much dividing these two in head-to-head matchups either. The season series is deadlocked at six wins a piece entering Friday’s action, with a run differential of only four in favor of St. Louis.
With three of the final seven head-to-head matchups between the Brewers and Cardinals coming up this weekend, it’s a massive opportunity for either team to put themselves in the driver's seat as the pennant race heats up.