How can Arrieta improve on ’15? What if he has a Cy Young start?

ANAHEIM, Calif. – It’s no coincidence that when Jake Arrieta’s season took off last summer, so did the Cubs’.

By the time he started making history after the All-Star break, the Cubs were the best team in baseball and well on the way toward the World Series-favored status they took into his Opening Day start Monday against the Angels.

It’s ridiculous, of course, to expect him to repeat the best finish for a pitcher in major league history.

But what if he does the one thing he didn’t do so well last year: Pitch like a Cy Young winner early in the season?

Already the most important player on a team headed into its most anticipated season in decades, he’s poised to play a role like no pitcher has for this franchise.

“I intend to start quick, and fast, and not look back,” said Arrieta, who picked up where he left off last season with five scoreless innings to open the season and a 3-0 lead against the Angels as Monday night’s late opener headed to the sixth.

“That’s just the competitive nature, the desire to win and to be better than anybody else,” he said. “But with that being said, you still have to go out there and compete and perform.”

The first 13 starts of last season did not always look so crisp, his season grinding along at 6-5 with a 3.40 ERA in the middle of June after a six-walk start against the Indians.

Arrieta was 3-4 with a 4.07 ERA over a nine-start stretch when his season suddenly turned on a Sunday afternoon in Minnesota with a four-hit shutout.

After that, he turned into a power-pitching, swaggering combination of Roger Clemens, Pedro Martinez and Clint Eastwood.

“It was the confidence and the trust factor with my stuff, knowing that I can complete games easier than I thought just by having conviction with all my stuff and being down in the zone,” he said.

More aggressive in the zone early in the count. Expanding the zone later. Not worrying about missing bats (considering contact against him wasn’t typically very good anyway).

As he faced the Angels in Anaheim in his second career Opening Day start Monday, that’s what Arrieta brings back into this season. What he expects to carryover into a fast start and full season – even if his second-half numbers last year become impossible to replicate.

“It’s hard to pitch to numbers,” Arrieta said. “It’s more important for me to just prepare in the manner that creates success, and that’s where I feel I’m at right now.”

His 0.86 ERA over his final 20 starts: the first in history under 1.00 for such a season-ending stretch. His 0.75 ERA after the All-Star break was also a major-league record. His 0.41 ERA the final two months (11-0, four runs allowed, including a no-hitter mixed in) was another record.

“I think he has just taught himself to be a present-tense guy,” Manager Joe Maddon said. “I think his preparation has a lot to do with that. His routine has a lot to do with that. … A self-awareness, an understanding of what he’s capable of doing on a daily basis.

“That’s where the edge has shown up. It’s between his ears.”

Arrieta didn’t lose a game the final two months of the season – leading a 42-18 team surge in that span.

“If you’re .500 the other four days, you have a .600 winning percentage,” Hoyer said. “That’s a really awesome thing to have. We had that from the All-Star break on.”

And if he brings that contribution level to winning into this season – regardless of where the pitching numbers fall – consider the implications.

In 1995, the Mariners won 27 of Randy Johnson’s 30 starts (.900), went 52-63 in their other games (.452) and won their division (advancing to the ALCS).

The 1999 Red Sox were barely a .500 team (68-63) when Pedro Martinez pitched, but because they were 26-5 in his starts, they won a wild-card playoff berth and wound up in the ALCS.

And Bucky Dent never sniffs the chance to earn a new middle initial (“F”) in New England in 1978 if his Yankees don’t win 30 of Ron Guidry’s 35 starts – needing every one of them to get a shot at beating the Red Sox in a division-winning tiebreaker because the rest of the team played .547 baseball without Guidry. The Yankees won the World Series that year.

“No starting pitcher is automatic,” Hoyer said, “but certainly having that guy who can lead your rotation and have a good chance to get a ‘W’ certainly takes pressure off the other four guys in the rotation.”

For Arrieta it’s about doing his part – even if it’s a much larger part than some teammates’ – to put the Cubs in the driver’s seat early in the playoff chase.

“Regardless of the expectations, we all want to get off to a good start,” Arrieta said. “Everybody wants to separate themselves from the pack as early as possible. Especially after the experience we had last year with the team in our division, it’s going to be even more important for us to try to jump ahead of the pack quickly.”