The Milwaukee Brewers and Chicago Cubs are staring down the barrel of the same gun this weekend when they both open up four game sets with the first and second place teams in the NL Central.

The Brewers will face the St. Louis Cardinals who themselves sit a half game back in the division, while Milwaukee is 8.5 games back.

The Cubs will take on the first place Cincinnati Reds. Chicago is 9.5 games out of first.

There stands the very real possibility that one or both of these teams will be completely out of the hunt when we wake up Monday morning, though I struggle at this point to find many reasons to believe they are in right now.

Only two teams in the majors have scored fewer runs than the Houston Astros (the Orioles and the Mariners) no team has scored less than the Pittsburgh Pirates. Yet both of these teams managed to take two of three from the Brewers and Cubs respectively.

Only the Arizona Diamondbacks have allowed more runs than the Pirates in 2010, yet the Cubs scratched just five runs in their latest three game series. Oh, and those aforementioned Mariners. Yes, that is the same team that took two of three from the Cubs just a week ago, outscoring them 12-4.

The Brewers did manage to go 15-13 in the month of June, winning seven of their last 10, but this new month will prove to be a bit more difficult. It begins tonight with the Cardinals and is followed by four games with the Giants, who despite struggling lately, have one of the best pitching staffs in baseball.

The Cubs finished June 10-16, including going 4-8 against Pittsburgh, Houston and Seattle, all bottom of the barrel teams. July will be much tougher (though no Pirates so...), they have four with the Reds, four with the Dodgers, four with the Phillies and three with the Cardinals. If the Reds don't finish off the Cubs, it's likely one of those teams will.

Look for the opponents reactions from both series at Three Way Chili (Reds) and Cards Diaspora