The Pittsburgh Pirates (95-61) have one last chance to supplant the MLB's best club from their position atop the NL Central. The St. Louis Cardinals (98-58) will travel to PNC Park to take on their division rival for the last time in the regular season.
Scroll to the bottom for the MLB live stream and radio broadcast. The matchup is tonight's MLB.TV's Free Game of the Day.
Pittsburgh did a good job over the weekend and took two out of three from the Chicago Cubs, while the Cardinals dropped two out of four to the Milwaukee Brewers. The Pirates remain three games behind the Cardinals for first place in the division and have the opportunity to sweep their rivals to make the final games of the season come down to the wire.
It starts tonight at 7:05 p.m. when Pirates' left-hander J.A. Happ faces off against Cardinals' right-hander Lance Lynn.
Happ has been a wonder ever since arriving in Pittsburgh before the trade deadline. He's 6-2 with a 2.28 ERA, 1.13 WHIP and 58 strikeouts in nine starts (51 1/3 innings), which includes a win against the Cardinals (7 IP, 3 H, 0 ER) earlier this month.
Lynn has also been good for the Cardinals, especially after the team lost Adam Wainwright for the season back in April. The right-hander is 12-10 with a 3.16 ERA, 1.36 WHIP and 159 strikeouts in 29 starts (165 1/3 innings), but he hasn't been good against Pittsburgh (0-2 with a 6.94 ERA and 1.80 WHIP in three starts).
With Carlos Martinez and Yadier Molina out for the rest of the season, the Cardinals are going to need as much help as they can get, especially against the Pirates, who have won nine out of their last 10 games.
St. Louis can take home their third straight NL Central title if they win two out of three games in Pittsburgh this week, but the Pirates won't make it easy. The last thing either of these clubs wants to do is battle the Cubs in the one-game wild-card playoffs.
The Cardinals received a boost to their lineup with the returns of Matt Holliday, Matt Adams and Randal Grichuk, who will need to step up during Molina's absence.
On the other hand, Pittsburgh has put together a balanced attack, scoring 47 runs and giving up 28 runs in their past 10 games. Outfielder Andrew McCutchen will look to break out of his recent slump while the team looks to shake off being dominated by Cubs' right-hander Jake Arrieta on Sunday.
Click here for tonight's lineups.
Check out the live stream for tonight's game here as well as the live radio broadcast here (PIT) or here (STL).
