St. Louis Cardinals vs San Diego Padres Matchup Preview - September 22nd, 2022

Editor

Jack Flaherty (96th ranked SP via THE BAT) is projected to take the mound for Cardinals as they battle the Padres and Joe Musgrove (36th ranked SP) at Petco Park. The quick scouting report on Flaherty: his main fastball is a four-seamer, which he uses 48.6% of the time. His primary out-pitch is a slider (26.5%). Meanwhile, Musgrove primarily throws a four-seamer fastball (23.5%) and his most-used secondary offering is his slider (24.9%). The Sharp Model X projects Flaherty for 2.8 earned runs and 4.7 strikeouts in this matchup. On the other side, Musgrove is forecasted for 2.5 earned runs and 5.3 strikeouts.

St. Louis Cardinals Insights

  • Jack Flaherty has been given an above-average leash since the start of last season, throwing 6.0 more adjusted pitches-per-game than the average starting pitcher.

  • Lars Nootbaar has seen a sizeable increase in his exit velocity recently; just compare his 99.7-mph average in the past 14 days to his seasonal 91.6-mph average.

  • St. Louis's 92.2-mph exit velocity on flyballs ranks them as the #9 team in the game since the start of last season by this standard.

San Diego Padres Insights

  • Contrary to popular belief, fastballs are generally a pitcher's least effective pitch. Joe Musgrove has utilized his non-fastballs 5.4% less often this year (69.8%) than he did last season (75.2%).

  • Josh Bell is an extreme groundball batter and matches up with the strong infield defense of St. Louis (#2-best on the slate today).

  • Ha-seong Kim hits a lot of his flyballs to center field (40.1% — 98th percentile) and is fortunate to face MLB's 2nd-shallowest CF fences today.

Betting Trends

  • The San Diego Padres have hit the 1st Five Innings (F5) Total Over in 14 of their last 26 games (+4.30 Units / 15% ROI)

  • The St. Louis Cardinals have hit the 1st Five Innings (F5) Total Under in 8 of their last 17 games (+2.45 Units / 13% ROI)

  • Corey Dickerson has hit the Total Bases Over in 11 of his last 15 away games (+8.25 Units / 45% ROI)