Dodgers 0 Cubs 2: Jake Arrieta Was Unhittable

Jayne Kamin-Oncea-USA TODAY Sports

Welp before you panic, know this, Jake Arrieta is one of the best pitchers in the national league. It was one of the best performances of the season, as he struck out 12 batters, only walked one and shut down a Dodgers offense that has been hitting very well lately and the Dodgers lost the 3rd game of the series versus the Cubs.

Wood versus Arrieta was a pretty huge mismatch, Jake’s ERA is down to a minuscule 2.11 and his FIP isn’t far behind at 2.48, but if you’re looking for positive news out of a pretty excremental game, Alex Wood looked like an okay middle of the rotation option, as he went 6 strong innings, striking out 7 and only walking one, his command wasn’t exactly impeccable, as he gave up a 2 run home run to Kris Bryant in the first inning, but he matched Arrieta the rest of the way, more starts like this could solidify the rotation going into a super important stretch run.

Enrique Hernandez played a pretty big part of the game, in the 3rd inning he hit a liner to Starlin Castro that was very graciously scored an error, it was frustrating, but Adrian Gonzalez stated it best after the game (via truebluela)

"I asked five of their players at first base, and they all said that should have been a hit… but at the end of the day the only thing that matters is that we lost."

Oh and Kiké pulled up after making the last out of the 8th, the team is calling it hamstring tightness and that’s probably the worst news of the night, the team cannot afford to lost him for a significant amount of time, his versatility and 134 wRC+ are irreplaceable for the team considering Howie Kendrick‘s ¯_(ツ)_/¯ status.

And in the end the Hernandez news and Wood development are the only thing that mattered, the bullpen got through 3 scoreless innings, Wood looked good, and the offense scored 22 runs in the last 5 games coming into tonight, games like these will happen, Jake Arrieta is probably having the 2nd best season of any pitcher in the game, if nothing else tonight feels a whole lot better than when the team got no hit just 9 days ago versus Mike Fiers.

At least the Giants lost and at worst the Dodgers will still have a division lead if the worst happens and they get swept at home versus their archrivals next series.