Joel Pineiro pitched his 6th career shutout for the Angels against their rival A’s en route to a 4-0 victory.  He went 9 innings for the complete game, only giving up four hits and no runs.   It wasn’t a very flashy complete game shutout, but Pineiro got it done with a variety of flyouts and groundouts.  He did have 5 strikeouts but he wasn’t exactly blowing anyone away.  He hit his spots and the hitters were unable to catch up.  He also only walked 1 batter and threw 62 of his 98 pitches for strikes.  The win brought his record to 2-4 and his ERA down to a respectable 3.71.

Pineiro is a solid pitcher and a good complement to what should be a great starting staff on paper.  The Angels starters, however have alternated between awful starts and great starts.  If they can find the consistency of years past, they will be in good position to win the division.  If not, they may be on the outside looking in when October rolls around.  For now, Pineiro has earned the “Stat Line of the Night”.

Facing off against the second-place Milwaukee Brewers, Pineiro led his Cardinals to a 5-1 victory after allowing only one run, which came in the fifth inning, and holding the opposition there until the St. Louis bats woke up in the eighth for five runs.  Pineiro would close out the ninth for the complete game three-hitter, also recording five strikeouts while only allowing the single run.  Such an outing was enought to earn him  “The Stat Line Of The Night” for Thursday, July 9th, 2009.

With the victory to close out their series, the Cards now find themselves up 2.0 games on the Brewers.  Up next is the Chicago Cubs, another division foe.  The Cubs sit only 3.5 back of the Cards and will surely be looking to close that gap in baseballs tightest division.

On the road, Pineiro sent the home town fans home in disgust as he pitched nine innings of shutout ball.  The most unbelievable part of it all was that he alone tallied the same number of hits at the plate as the entire Mets team did against him, and he recorded one more total base than the opposition.  Pineiro allowed only two singles, while striking out just one batter.  At the plate he was 2 for 4 with a double and a single.  An all-around game like that was enough to earn him honors as “The Stat Line Of The Night” for Tuesday June 23rd, 2009.

The win for the Cards helps them move another game up on the Brewers in their battle atop the NL Central.  The division is tight all the way through, with the last place Pirates only 8.0 games out.  With the season approaching the midway point, expect someone to start making their move soon.  Then it will be a matter of who can keep up and who will be left behind.