PITTSBURGH — There’s something about this Pirates’ season and the Wild Card matchup with Jake Arrieta that has a Hollywood feel. Every single aspect of it is almost like it was written for a classic sports movie, from the “Team beats everyone, but still can’t beat that one guy that they will square off against in the big battle at the end of the movie” aspect to the “Team starts slow, quickly becomes one of the best teams, suffers a setback after a key injury, slumps a bit, but revives themselves at the end” angle.
That would make Jake Arrieta the Clu Haywood/Jack Parkman/The Hawks/Team Iceland of this story.