Entering Sunday’s game against the Chicago Cubs the Pittsburgh Pirates were reeling from being smacked around by the Chicago Cubs like they stole something but the Pirates ace Gerrit Cole righted the ship beating the Cubs by the score of 2-1.
Cole became slightly testy when it was pointed out to him that the Cubs were the best team in Major League Baseball. He didn’t exactly agree with that assessment. “It was just an opportunity to try to salvage the series. I don’t really think that they’re the best team in baseball.”
Was Cole just irritated with a hard fought win or is he like the rest of us sorta kind leery of Arrieta’s new found “legendary” status?
It seems a bit odd that when the great Barry Bonds, the former Pittsburgh Pirate and San Francisco Giant concluded one season built like Pee Wee Herman and came back the next season looking like “Andre the Giant,” every talking head that could move its mouth had theory, after theory, after theory as to whether Bonds had made a few trips to Moscow for a little bit of “Ivan the Greats’” “holistic” medical treatment and medications for his many little “bumps and bruises.”
Now Chicago Cubs starting pitcher Jake Arrieta who was downright awful before 2013 has now found this “fountain of excellence.”
Arrieta recently told USA Today‘s Bob Nightengale that; ”I’ve heard players, and I’m talking about some of the best players in the league, question whether I’ve taken steroids or not. Some of the things I hear are pretty funny, and some people are idiots, frankly. I’ll see on Twitter, ‘My close source revealed to me he’s on steroids.’ Well, the 10 tests I take a year say otherwise. I eat plants. I eat lean meat. I work out. And I do things the right way. ”
Bob Nightengale also pointed out: “that after going 20-25 with a 5.46 ERA over the course of three-and-a-half seasons with the Orioles, Arrieta has turned the corner and morphed into one of MLB‘s most dominant pitchers. Steady improvement was evident during the second half of the 2013 season and the 2014 campaign, but his 2015 campaign served as a revelation of sorts.”
Okay….but please allow me to pose this question to ‘yinz’ guys’ and dolls’? Is that an indicator that before the 2013 season that Arrieta was eating things other than plants and meat?
C’mon gimme a break. I once asked a wise man, ‘Dr. Vinny Boom-Boom’ what was the difference between organic and non-organic meats and veggies?
He replied: “foods are only organic when Sal the organ grinder plays the organ at least an hour a day while his monkey is doing backflips during a solar eclipse simultaneously as the plants are growing and the livestock is eating.”
As far as his physique is concerned, is it possible that Jake Arrieta concluded the 2013 season looking like the immortal mouse “Mr. Jingles” from the movie “The Green Mile” and began the 2014 MLB season looking like Karrot the Kangaroo? Has the Cubs team as well as the Chi-Town pitching staff crossed the threshold of greatness or has the squad abandoned the “South Beach diet” for the Arrieta “meat and plants diet?
Well I guess we are going to have to wait and see. (Sources for this article were www.usatoday.com and www.bleacherreport.com)
Aubrey Bruce can be reached at: abruce@newpittsburghcourier.com or 412.583.6741
Follow him on Twitter@ultrascribe
Inside Conditions…Take the “Cole” train