Arrieta shows why he's in the Cy Young picture
Jake Arrieta probably won't win the Cy Young Award this season.
But he'll be in the team picture. His name likely will be somewhere on the ballot of every Cy Young voter among the Baseball Writers Association of America.
It's an elite group of candidates, with Arrieta finding himself in the rarefied air with Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke of the Dodgers, Jacob DeGrom of the Mets and Max Scherzer of the Nationals.
Arrieta started Thursday night's series opener for the Chicago Cubs against the Atlanta Braves and worked 6 shutout innings as the Cubs won 7-1 to snap a three-game losing streak.
It has been another solid season for the 29-year-old Arrieta, who emerged as the ace of the staff last year and who has retained the unofficial title this season despite last winter's signing of Jon Lester.
Arrieta entered Thursday tied for the National League lead in victories, with 14, and he took over the major-league lead by going to 15-6 with a 2.30 ERA. But wins by pitchers have become viewed as less important as other stats such as WHIP (walks plus hits per 1 inning pitched) and FIP (fielding independent pitching) have emerged as measuring sticks.
Arrieta's WHIP of 0.99 placed him sixth in the NL entering Thursday; Greinke was the leader at 0.86.
In ERA, Arrieta's 2.39 mark entering the day was fourth, behind Greinke (1.58), DeGrom (1.98) and Kershaw (2.34).
FIP is scaled to ERA, and it takes into account those things out of the hands of fielders, such as walks, strikeouts and home runs. Arrieta and DeGrom were tied for third in FIP (2.67) behind Kershaw (2.18) and Greinke (2.54).
None of it seems to faze Arrieta, especially the wins total.
“I don't put much into it, really, at all,” he said. “The only thing that matters, really, is getting back on track as a team. We had a couple tough games against Detroit after a good run. My job and my mindset was to come out and put a stop to that and get us going in the right direction. Get another streak going.”
Arrieta also shook off the Cy Young talk even though manager Joe Maddon agrees his guy belongs among the elite.
“Absolutely, there's no question he is,” Maddon said. We've watched it all year. He's been really, really consistent, with high-end stuff.
“It's not like it's a coincidence that he's pitched this well, whether it's velocity, just pure velocity and movement off that velocity and then the other pitches. The slider, the curveball, the changeup, everything going on, with command. And he's strong, because he can finish what he begins.
“There's so much positive rolling there with him right now, he's got to be in consideration for all those things. He's among the elite pitchers in the National League, probably in baseball. Beyond that, when it comes to awards at the end of the year, he has to be considered strongly.”
Arrieta turned in his 12th straight quality start as he ran his pitch count to 107 over 6 innings.
The Cubs got Arrieta all the run support he needed in a 4-run third inning. The big hit was a 3-run homer by Anthony Rizzo, his 24th of the season. Addison Russell hit a solo homer in the fourth.