The Weekend Gist: Pirates Edition

What Happened: The Cubs continued to put the hurting on the Pirates. I know that we all wanted to see the sweep at Wrigley, but that's just greed. If you would have asked any Cubs fan before the season started if they would be happy going 4-2 against the Pirates over the first 6 matchups with the Cubs and I bet all of them would gladly take it, so the fact that the Cubs are 5-1 against Pittsburgh in mid-May is just gravy. And hell, the Cubs almost won Sunday's game too!

What Looked Good: Did you see Jake Arrieta on Saturday? He was vintage (and by that, I mean 2015) Arrieta. And I know it's hard to complain about a guy that hasn't had an ERA over two in like, a year and a half and also threw two no-hitters over that time, but for the last handful of starts, Arrieta hadn't looked like the invincible world-buster we've come to know and love. His control seemed off. He didn't seem like he was striking out as many guys on a whim like he did last year. But after a rough 4th inning when he gave up 2 ER (THE HORROR!), Arrieta seemed to get locked in the same way he got locked in during his historic second half last year and absolutely mowed down the Pirates.

Also Looking Good: Don't look now, but Jason Heyward has a .409 OBP over the last two weeks and looks like he's actually driving the ball a lot better than he was during April. I feel like he's going to be due for what Zobrist did a few weeks ago, where after the pressure of his first Cubs home run is off, he'll relax a bit more and go on some kind of tear. As Fowler cools off (and he should because his April was absolutely unsustainable), Heyward will be a big key in how the Cubs lineup functions over the next few weeks.

TMS Cock of the Week: That would be Gerrit Cole of the Pirates, having this to say after shutting down the Cubs on Sunday:

Gerrit Cole on the Cubs: "I don't really think they're the best team in baseball."

— Travis Sawchik (@Sawchik_Trib) May 15, 2016

Look, I know that sometimes players think it's a good idea to always think of their own team as the best team in baseball and I understand that to a certain extent. But 2 caveats:

1. The Cubs are, in juuust about every single measurement, absolutely the best team in baseball. When you start talking about historic starts to a season, which the Cubs have had, you gotta give them that title until you knock them off. Had the Pirates even taken 2 out of 3 from the Cubs, maybe Cole can get away with that. But they didn't. And in the 5 games the Cubs have won against the Pirates this year, none of them were even particularly close.

2. Notice that Cole waited to say that he didn't think the Cubs are the best team in baseball until after he had a good start against them. Meaning he didn't have the balls to say that when the Cubs bitchslapped him for 6 runs in less than 5 innings the week prior.

What a cock. Congrats, Gerrit! You're the Cock of the Week!

The Chicago Tribune has a good piece on what Cole's comments say about the Cubs being in the Pirates heads. Go read it here.

"YOU ARE NEXT" (brought to you by TMS Correspondent Chong Li):

The Cubs hit lots of home runs. The Brewers give up a lot of home runs. Miller Park is a ballpark that favors the home run. Expect the Cubs to hit all the home runs over the next 3 games in Milwaukee. The Cubs and Brewers kick off a series at 7:10 CST tonight with Kyle Hendricks facing former Diamondback and current human garbage Chase Anderson.