Today's Diamondbacks starting pitcher, Brandon Webb, above, tries not to show too much emotion on the mound. Today's Cubs starter, Carlos Zambrano, takes the same approach: "I try to be calm," Zambrano says.

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PHOENIX — Brandon Webb won the 2006 Cy Young Award, but he might be experiencing the most professional growth in 2007.

With the D-backs skidding out of contention by late August last season, Webb toiled without much pressure en route to a 16-8 record and 3.10 ERA.

This season, he has had to carry the scoring-challenged D-backs for much of the season, deal with the pressure of a 42-inning scoreless streak in July and August, and hold the blistering-hot Colorado Rockies to two runs over seven innings to clinch a playoff spot Friday in Denver.

Now Webb has to face Chicago ace Carlos Zambrano in a pitching duel today that is expected to set the tone of the series. Beat Webb, goes a common theory, and the Cubs can close down the D-backs in three or four games.

But Webb may have both the personality and experience to get through it.

"He's a pretty composed guy," D-backs manager Bob Melvin said. "You can't really tell whether or not things are bothering him out there."

And that is exactly Webb's strategy. It is not just an aw-shucks Kentucky thing.

"I think I mask it a little bit," Webb said. "I think it's best not to show too much emotion when you're out there on the field."

So when his scoreless inning streak ended Aug. 22 against Milwaukee, Webb walked off the field with a slightly raised fist to signal to the crowd. Inside, Webb said later, he felt a huge sigh of relief that the pressure was over.

"The game I started here against the Brewers was the most pressure I've probably felt in my career," Webb said. "I think these games should compare to something like the end of the streak."

Surprisingly, though, Webb said Friday's effort at Colorado felt like "just another game." It did not feel that way to Melvin, who lifted Webb from a scheduled start in Pittsburgh a day earlier because he feared wasting him on a potential rainy day — only to throw him into the fire at Coors Field.

"I think that was as difficult a game for him to have to deal with as he's had all year," Melvin said. "That was a game that we needed to have. Externally, you're not going to see anything about him that would suggest that he's doing anything different, but I think internally, he had to step back and kind of remove himself for a minute and move forward knowing it was going to be a much different situation that he would have been in the day before."

There is no doubt what is on the line this time. Both Webb and Zambrano know it, though neither is likely to show it.

"I don't want to be pumped up," Zambrano said. "I want to be calm and let the moment come and pitch my game. I don't want to do too much."