The talk heading into last year’s Cubs Convention was all about whether the team would lock Jake Arrieta up long-term after an historic Cy Young campaign. For his part, the ace played the stock-answer card when the subject was broached: I love it in Chicago, I’ve got at least two more years here. An agreement on a raise, the largest ever for a second-year arb-eligible pitcher, was reached just days before the deadline and the talk was postponed for another year.
The air was let out of that balloon just before this year’s CubsCon was set to open, when it was announced that the two sides had agreed to a another not-small increase that would pay Arrieta $15.