Tonight at 8:15 p.m. ET the Chicago Cubs (3-6) will head to St. Louis to face the reigning National League champion Cardinals (5-4) in an NL Central grudge match. Live stream the game by clicking this link; Cubs fans can find the game on WGN 720, while Cardinals fans can get the radio broadcast on 1120 KMOX. The Cubs will send ace Jeff Samardzija (0-1, 1.29 ERA) to the rubber to face off with Joe Kelly (1-0, 1.69 ERA).
The Cubs have been shut out in each of Samardzija's first two starts, leaving him winless despite a sterling ERA. The man they call "Shark" isn't even coming close to calling out his offense though.
"I see these guys working every day, I know what they're doing," Samardzija said of his teammates. "If it were a different situation, if I thought these guys were being lazy or this or that, obviously it'd be different. But these guys come to work every day, doing everything we can. It's early in the season, we're going to keep going, keep pushing and figure this out."
The Cubbies are fifth-worst in the NL in terms of striking out, and are below average in runs per game (3.67). Joe Kelly is far from an ace, however, and his ERA is a bit misleading since he owns a 1.87 WHIP after walking four batters in five innings vs. the Pirates.
"I made some good pitches when I had to but I struggled a little with my command from time to time," Kelly said, acknowledging the luck he had.
While the Cubs were expected to struggle at the plate, the Cardinals rank below them in runs per game (3.22). Manager Mike Matheny addressed the power outage-- "There's a couple of games where if we had a couple of things go our way, we could be even better," Matheny said. "But I do believe that there's obviously more in our tank offensively."
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