Jake Arrieta flirting with historic season in earning 19th win for Cubs

Jake Arrieta is doing all he can to win the National League Cy Young Award in a season with several quality candidates.

When Arrieta takes the mound again for the Chicago Cubs early next week against Pittsburgh, he will be trying to become the first 20-game winner in the major leagues this season. Arrieta earned his 19th victory in the first game of a doubleheader at Philadelphia on Friday.

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He pitched eight innings allowing six hits with seven strikeouts and two walks and dropped his ERA for the season to 1.99. He also lowered his ERA since the All-Star break to 0.93, which, if the season ended today, Arrieta would have the lowest ERA in history after the break for a pitcher with a minimum of 75 innings pitched.

Want another amazing stat from Arrieta’s season? He earned a measure of revenge Friday beating the Phillies who are the only team to beat him in his last 16 starts. All it took for Philadelphia to get that win back on July 25 was Cole Hamels pitching a no-hitter against the Cubs.

[On this week’s StewPod: Jose Altuve joins us to talk about the surprising Astros.]

It was the eighth consecutive start in which Arrieta has earned a win, and he figures to have four more chances to earn his 20th victory before the end of the regular season. He would be the first Cubs pitcher to win 20 games in a season since Jon Lieber did so in 2001.

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Kyle Ringo is a contributing writer to Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @KyleRingo