Cubs move to next round!
If there’s one thing you take away from today’s Chicago Cubs vs. Pittsburgh Pirates wild card series, it has to be the fact that Jake Arrieta is an unstoppable machine.
The Chicago ace is 12-0 with a 0.37 ERA since August 1 and made history with the best ERA ever after the All-Star game. And the Pirates found the hard way on Wednesday night during the National League wild card game.
Playing on the road in Pittsburgh, the young Cubs held their own, scoring on multiple occasions and relying on their bats to carry the team just as much as Arrieta’s complete game. The 4-0 win gives Arrieta 31 scoreless innings, which is absolutely unstoppable. This is the reason why Cubs manager Joe Madden tweaked the lineup a month before the season was over to coincide Arrieta pitching tonight’s game.
The Cubs bats got hot to start the game, with Kyle Schwarber bringing Dexter Fowler with a clutch hit to left field, earning him an RBI. Then in the 3rd inning, Schwarber completely smashed a home run to right field, hitting it out of the park and putting Chicago up 3-0. By the fifth inning, Fowler smashed a solo HR to right to put them up 4-0.
The Pirates couldn’t get anything going on the night, as Arrieta only allowed four hits and struck out 11 on the night.
It was an absolutely memorable night for the pitcher, considering the fact the Cubs haven’t been past the wild-card in 12 years. They now face the MLB leading St. Louis Cardinals, who they struggle against earlier in the season, but beat two out of three later on in the year. The Cubs won 11-8 in the season series, as the Cardinals lost six of their past nine meetings.