With Arrieta on mound, impressive Cubs rebound vs. Rockies

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Dexter Fowler (right) celebrates with Javy Baez (left) and Addison Russell after the Cubs defeated the Colorado Rockies 6-2 on Saturday at Wrigley Field. | Nam Y. Huh/AP

In the bleakest days of the Cubs’ rebuild, when Nate Schierholtz batted cleanup and Ian Stewart was viewed as the answer at third base, some suits in the executive offices took to speaking in terms of “when” we win the World Series, not “if.”

It was no more presumptuous than signing up an official champagne provider long before anything worth celebrating was on the horizon, or adding a party room to the new Hugh Hefner-designed home clubhouse. The cramped, antiquated room it replaced was a daily reminder that more than a century has passed since the Cubs last toasted a World Series winner.

Baseball operations people might have had that in mind as they took a more cautious view. If last season’s 97 wins and exhilarating run to the National League Championship Series validated their decision to tear things down and start over, those feats also pushed optimism/expectations to absurd levels for this year.

But there are no certainties in baseball. Too many things can happen over six months and 162 games, such as charismatic slugger Kyle Schwarber tearing up his knee and being lost for the season in the third game of 2016.

Meanwhile, there are occasional games such as Friday’s — the Cubs had as many errors (four) as hits in a 6-1 loss to the Colorado Rockies — to remind us that nobody’s perfect.

Thing is, when Jake Arrieta is working, the Cubs don’t have to be perfect. They were good enough Saturday to put the previous day’s messiness behind them, beating the Rockies 6-2 before 41,702 witnesses at postcard-pretty Wrigley Field.

“It’s not always an oil painting,” manager Joe Maddon had said of Friday’s performance. “Today was a great example of the power of 24 hours.”

Not to mention the power of a pitcher who’s a good bet to win every time he takes the mound. Baseball’s most dominant arm of 2015 shows no signs of tailing off, as Arrieta raised his record to 3-0 and lowered his ERA to 1.23, with 20 strikeouts and only two walks in 22 innings.

Anthony Rizzo, Jorge Soler and Dexter Fowler slugged home runs, and Javy Baez and Kris Bryant made exemplary fielding plays on Arrieta’s behalf.

“Great game for us all the way around,” Maddon said, “but it always comes back to starting pitching, and Jake was outstanding.”

Old-timers have been debating the value of “quality starts” since the stat was invented, but Arrieta’s line — eight scoreless innings, five hits, one walk, eight strikeouts — was his 23rd consecutive start of surpassing quality. He has not allowed a run at Wrigley since July 2015, a span of 48⅔ innings.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Maddon said. “I’m not really into the numbers, but 23 quality starts in a row . . . that’s pretty solid.”

To catcher David Ross, it was just another day at the office.

“Good stuff, great fastball command, aggressive,” Ross said. “Typical Jake. He made it look easy.”

Arrieta wasn’t totally satisfied.

“My timing was just OK,” he said. “I threw a lot of breaking balls early for strikes. I had a pretty good mix that kept them off balance.”

The Cubs’ ace bears scant resemblance to the frustrated scuffler they spirited away from the Baltimore Orioles in a 2013 deal that ranks among the jackpot moves of the Theo Epstein regime. Arrieta was 20-25 with a 5.46 ERA over three-plus seasons with the Orioles. As a Cub, he’s 39-13 with a 2.20 ERA. Maddon, the former Tampa Bay Rays manager, saw plenty of Arrieta as an American League East rival.

“A scout who saw him in Baltimore would have loved him,” Maddon said. “Fabulous arm, terrific stuff. . . . He projected as a quality big-league starting pitcher. But something always happened, or he’d make a mistake, and we’d get him. He was not getting the results to match his ability.

“When he got here, he and [pitching coach Chris Bosio] tweaked a few things, and he basically went back to what had worked for him in the past. Personally, I favor that. I don’t believe in radical adjustments unless you’re dealing with total failure. His preparation, his work ethic and his focus are off the charts.”

“This game can humble you in a heartbeat,” Arrieta said. “It’s why I put in the work I do between starts. I never take anything for granted.”

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