Jake Arrieta has worst start since June 16, Cubs still beat Cardinals

CHICAGO — Breaking their traditional doomsday stereotype, fans of the Chicago Cubs showed up to Monday’s Game 3 of the NLDS a confident bunch. The living tall tale known as Jake Arrieta was taking the mound against the St. Louis Cardinals. He’d been automatic enough all summer to allow fans to prematurely dream of a clinching scenario for the Cubs in Tuesday’s Game 4.

A few hours later, delirious Cubs fans left a Wrigley Field having sealed the opportunity to cheer their team into their first NLCS since 2003. But in an unexpected twist, the man who came in on a historic pitching tear (and has his bearded face on most of the bootleg shirts being sold outside the park) didn’t have much to do with it.

(AP Photo/Paul Beaty)

Though Arrieta was credited with the win and struck out nine batters in Chicago’s 8-6 victory, he looked mortal giving up four runs over 5 2/3 innings of work in windy conditions.

“He wasn’t as sharp as he normally is,” Cubs manager Joe Maddon said. “I saw that from the beginning.”

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With Arrieta looking more normal than usual, the night’s headlines went instead to a lineup that clubbed a postseason-record six homers and a bullpen that shut the door on the type of meltdowns that have scarred Cubs fans in the past.

“This type of start hasn’t happened to me in quite some time,” Arrieta said in between handing out compliments to a lineup that usually spends its postgame complimenting its ace.

How long had it been since Arrieta surrendered four earned runs in a game and left before the end of the sixth inning? Writers were sent scrambling to baseball-reference.com after Arrieta gave up a two-run homer to Jason Heyward in the sixth inning and found it came during a June 16 in a 6-0 loss to the Cleveland Indians.

That was 21 starts, 118 days and one interminable Donald Trump candidacy ago. (Indeed, The Donald officially announced his run for president on June 16 and doesn’t that seem like a lifetime ago?) Put another way, June 16 was a few weeks before Arrieta was left off the National League All-Star team, even though he’s a favorite for the Cy Young award and currently holds an exalted status in Wrigleyville.

Arrieta’s name and face could be found on plenty of merchandise for anyone taking a lap of Wrigley Field’s perimeter on Monday afternoon. One T-shirt read that “Arrieta Knows No-Hitters,” another had his bearded caricature in the middle of an “ace” playing card. Yet another strangely had his name done up as the logo of Abita, a New Orleans-based brewery.

Arrieta jerseys were also seen everywhere with at least one local souvenir shop reportedly running out of the letter for A for customers who wanted his name lettered on the back.

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For his part, Arrieta said he didn’t remember that poor start against Cleveland (“I don’t remember two or three starts ago,” he said) and that he feels confident he’ll return to the “consistency” (an undersell if there ever was one) that saw him go 9-0 with a 0.24 ERA over the 10 starts before Monday’s game.

“[Arrieta] has been on such an incredible roll that it just had to come to an end at some point,” Maddon said. “But he kept them in check and permitted our bullpen to come in with a lead, which is important.”

It also gave Arrieta his second postseason win, though the one he earned after pitching a complete-game shutout against the Pittsburgh Pirates in last Wednesday’s wild card game is more of a credit to the stat.

After the game, Arrieta remained annoyed with two situations. The first was dealing back-to-back walks to Stephen Piscotty and Matt Holliday in a two-run fourth that allowed the Cardinals to tie the game at two. The second was surrendering that opposite-field homer to Heyward on a pitch on the outside of the plate in the sixth, even though it was only the third homer Arrieta had surrendered since mid-June.

“The long ball was a moment that kind of frustrated a little bit, based on the pitch,” Arrieta allowed. “It was a tough situation with Holliday before that … but every once in awhile that’ll happen.”

What wasn’t mentioned by Arrieta or anyone else were Arrieta’s nine strikeouts, no small luxury on a night when the wind might’ve been happy to push a routine fly or two by the Cardinals over the outfield wall.

Then again, when you go on a run of giving up nothing, a night of giving up anything is going to be more notable than it is for most pitchers.

Elsewhere in the victorious clubhouse, Starlin Castro talked about hitting one of the Cubs’ six homers and how the lineup had been happy to pick up a pitcher that spent most of late summer picking the team up.

Arrieta said he was happy to accept that help.

“I had to battle a little bit,” Arrieta said. “I got into some uncharacteristic situations, but they picked me up and that was good to see.”