Preview for the April 30th Game

Preview for the April 30^th Game

San Diego Padres (9-16) at Chicago Cubs (10-15)

The Chicago Cubs will be looking to end the month of April with two consecutive wins. The Cubbies are coming off a 5 to 3 win over the San Diego Padres and look to take a two to none series lead over the Padres. Edwin Jackson will be the probable pitcher for the Cubs and is sporting a record of 0-3 with an era of 4.76. Jackson will be looking for his first victory as a Cubbie and is coming off a quality start against the Miami Marlins. Edwin Jackson went six innings in that start, where he allowed 3 earned runs on five hits and 4 walks. If Jackson wants to have a successful season this year, he needs to limit his walk total and get through the first couple innings unscathed in his starts because those are two areas in his game that he is struggling at. I can see Jackson having a solid start against the Padres and could possibly pull out his first win of the year.

Jackson will be going up against the right-handed pitcher and ex- Red, Edison Volquez. Volquez is 1-3 with era of 6.39 and has had some outings were he has gotten rocked, however in his last two starts he has shown that his early stuggles might be over because he threw seven scoreless innings against the hard hitting Brewers. The pitches that Volquez pitches are a four seam fastball that is in the low to mid-90s, a curveball that has a normal break to it, a slider that can be nasty and a changeup which is a pitch that the Cubs hitters tend to struggle against. Volquez can be an effective pitcher if he can command his pitches well because he is four pitch pitcher that truly doesn’t just rely on one pitch.

The Cubs hitters should be looking forward to going up against Edison Volquez because when he is off his game he is extremely off his game. The Cubs will need to rely on Darwin Barney in today’s game because his track record against Volquez is the best among any other Cubbie; Barney has a .444 batting average against the starting pitcher for the Padres. Anthony Rizzo will get his first crack against his former teammate in tonight’s game and I strongly believe that Rizzo matches up well against Volquez.

My prediction for tonight’s game is the Cubbies pull out another win against the Padres with a score of 7 to 3. I predict that the Cubs hitters will take advantage of Volquez being a wild in tonight’s game and hit the ball hard off him. I believe that Edwin Jackson will get his first W in tonight’s game by going six innings and allowing 3 earned runs with seven punch outs. My predicted player of the game is Anthony Rizzo, I predict that he will go yard against his former team and teammate.