In the midst of their hottest streak this season, St Louis charges into Chicago to battle the Cubs.

Current Snapshot:

St Louis: 54-42, First Place NL Central, 1.5 games ahead of Cincinnati. The Cardinals had their season best 8-game winning streak snapped in extra innings on Thursday by Philadelphia. St Louis took 2 of 3 from the Cubs in Chicago back in May.

Chicago: 43-53, Third place NL Central, 11 games back. They have split their last 10 games (5-5). Since last meeting the Cardinals, Aramis Ramirez found his stroke, Carlos Zambrano melted down (again) and was held accountable for once, and Lou Piniella announced his retirement at the end of the season.

Pitching Matchups:

23 July: Jeff Suppan (0-3, 5.45 xFIP) vs Randy Wells (4-7, 3.72 xFIP). These two have never faced each other. Suppan pitched very well in his last outing against Los Angeles and threw six full innings for the first time this season. He’s already pitched at Wrigley this season, a game Milwaukee eventually won. Suppan is 4-4 career in Chicago, with his last win coming in 2008. Jeff has a lot of history against the guys in Chicago’s line-up; of the players who have faced Suppan 20 or more times (Marlon Byrd, Kosuke Fukudome, Ryan Theriot, Alfonso Soriano, Ramirez, Derrek Lee), only Theriot hasn’t homered, and only Soriano and Ramirez are hitting under .300. If the wind is blowing out, look out. Lee has absolutely killed Suppan in his career (6 HR; .429/.529/.875 in 68 plate appearances).

Wells has only faced the Cardinals three times, all at Wrigley, and his last start is one he likely wants to forget. Wells features a fastball about half the time, and mixes a slider or changeup in the other half. His slider is his best pitch, and one of the better sliders in the league. Given the three appearances, Cardinal hitting statistics against him are the epitome of small sample size; no one has more than seven plate appearances. They do lead to some interesting data, though – Wells has never retired Matt Holliday (1 for 1) or Colby Rasmus (2 for 2 with 2 walks). Only Yadier Molina has an extra base hit off him, and Randy Winn has never reached base (0 for 3).

24 July: Blake Hawksworth (4-5, 4.49 xFIP) vs Tom Gorzelanny (5-5, 4.03 xFIP). No one foresaw this as a mid-July matchup back in April, but here we are. Hawksworth will make his seventh career start and none of the previous six were against Chicago. He’s thrown 3 2/3 innings total against the Small Bears in his career, most recently on 29 May in Adam Ottavino’s first career start. Blake throws his fastball about 60% off the time, mixing in a changeup, curveball, and cutter for the rest. According to Fangraphs his cutter is his best pitch, but he only throws it 5% of the time. One wonders if some cutters were mis-identified as fastballs by Pitch f/x. No Cub has faced him more than twice. Hawksworth benefited from St Louis’ power surge on Monday night as he didn’t pitch well but came away with the win. That said, he has pitched better his last four games (ERA under 4.00), but his BABIP has been high (.333), so perhaps he is pitching even better than that.

Gorzelanny will make his first career start as a Cub against the Cardinals. He did make six starts opposing the St Louis Nine while a Pirate, the last time in June 2008, which also was the last time he pitched to the Redbirds. Pittsburgh was 2-4 in those six games (Gorzelanny went 1-3). He has pitched pretty well in those appearances; 16 ER in 37 2/3 innings (3.82 ERA). Fastball-slider-changeup are his weapons of choice, with the fastball and changeup being his best pitches.

Only Aaron Miles and Albert Pujols have more than 15 plate appearances against Gorzelanny. Miles is slashing a robust .467/.529/.533, so expect to see him in the lineup on Saturday. AP has a .979 career OPS against Gorzelanny.

25 July: Chris Carpenter (11-3, 3.73 xFIP) vs Ryan Dempster (8-7, xFIP 3.86). ESPN’s Sunday Night game promises to be a good one. Dempster has pitched better this season than his record indicates, and Carpenter has been lights out (16 IP, 10 K, 1.13 ERA, 2-0) in both starts since the All-Star break. Carpenter has been one of the best pitchers in baseball since 2004, and his record in Chicago is no exception (7-2, 3.66 ERA career). Chris has already beaten the Cubs at Wrigley this season. Oddly only a trio of current Cubs has more than 20 plate appearances against him (Lee, Ramirez, and Soriano). Soriano leads the way (.333/.351/.528) with 2 HR. Lee and Ramirez have also homered off him in their careers.

Dempster faced the Cardinals on 30 May and got smacked around, surrendering 6 in 6 2/3 innings pitched of a game the Cubs eventually lost 9-1. He’s made three other starts versus St Louis at Wrigley and had not lost before this year. Dempster throws a fastball and slider, with the occasional split finger as well for flavor. His slider is also excellent, though it is not quite as good as Wells.

Expect AP to chomp at the bit for this game to start. Pujols has tortured Dempster during his career (4 HR; .310/.412/.643). Expect Randy Winn to have something else to do while Ryan’s on the mound (2-22, 3 walks career). Skip Schumaker (.400 average) and Holliday (1.000 OPS) have enjoyed success as well.

Prognosis. No matter where these teams sit in the standings, this series is taut and well played. The Cardinals are hot; the Cubs are not, but it will not matter come first pitch Friday. Based on the matchups, I would expect Chicago to win Friday, St Louis Sunday, and Saturday’s game to be a toss-up.

I was watching the news recently, a story about people out protesting the spending by the federal government, and I was struck with a thought: I wonder if the recent worries I’ve been reading on blog posts about the Cardinals and large player salaries could be related.

Perhaps this is a recent phenomenon, brought on by recession-related news in the media, but I don’t recall reading many concerns from fans in the high-living days of 12-figure free-agent salaries handed out to one player after another. Quite the contrary; the calls from fans for their favorite team to nab the cream of the free agent crop were pretty common. The only concern was from fans complaining of an increase in ticket prices as a result of these new signings.

There have been several studies over the past few years indicating there is limited correlation between winning percentage and player payroll, including one from the University of Iowa that tracked data from 1995-2007, adjusted for inflation, that showed a correlation of winning percentage and a team’s player salaries of just 18 percent.

Then there’s the type of players upon owners lavish these salaries. Bill James did a study in the Baseball Abstract more than 20 years ago which demonstrated in the aggregate, a typical player’s performance peak is at or near age 27. Yet most free agents, who are required to put in at least six years’ service, are older than this and are at risk for decline.

The anecdotal evidence for teams such as the Cubs, who signed a number of free agents and extended the contracts of several others in an attempt to end a century-long championship drought, demonstrate the risk both of high salaries and the players they sign. There’s very little the team can do to move Derrek Lee, Aramis Ramirez, Carlos Zambrano, Alfonso Soriano or Kosuke Fukodome, aging players with mediocre numbers and large salaries. A number of other teams, like Houston with Carlos Lee, find themselves in similar predicaments. Spending on these proven veterans crowds out opportunities for emerging young stars, who find themselves blocked at the big-league level, and crowds out opportunity for stretch-drive trades and payroll boosts for a club fighting for a playoff spot.

Which brings me back to the introduction. After years of both quantitative study and anecdotal experience available, fans who otherwise might support a club signing a big-name free agent or providing a multi-million dollar extension over several years have begun to voice their concerns with such risks. Such as concerns federal and state government spending crowds out private sector investment in the marketplace, the concern for these fans is that high salaries paid to players over 30 is unsustainable for a team seeking long-term competitive and financial viability.

Which brings us to Albert Pujols.

Prince Albert turned 30 in January, and the Cardinals may have to consider an annual salary between $25-$30 million and perhaps an extension of up to seven years to keep him with the Birds on the Bat. Even Joe Strauss of the Post-Dispatch wonders if the club has a better than even chance of signing him to such a lucrative deal, especially after the team obligated so much of its player salary resources for the next seven years to Matt Holliday this past winter.

There is no question the Cardinals want to sign Albert Pujols, and need to sign him. He’s a fan favorite, he’s the face of the franchise, a genuine marketing phenomenon, one of the great men to play the game. His numbers ensure an easy path to enshrinement in Cooperstown five years after he retires.

But those fans who protest spending by the team have a point. Do the Cardinals make an emotional decision to obligate another large share of scarce financial resources to a second player and risk a situation as both distance themselves from that aggregate peak performance age of 27 that the Cubs now face? Or do they make perhaps the wiser fiscal decision to allow Pujols to walk knowing that the club then would be better positioned to capitalize on unknown opportunities in the future?

Like Joe Strauss, I am amazed that a share of Cardinals fans greater than zero actually would entertain either trading Pujols or allowing him to depart. And I wonder to what extent an awareness of financial issues in general thanks to these people out protesting government spending and our current recession has to do with it.