Arrieta leads Cubs to victory over Blue Jays

CHICAGO — Jake Arrieta may never duplicate the second half he had two years ago in winning the NL Cy Young Award. The Cubs don't care. They'll take what the righthander is giving them now.

Arrieta pitched into the seventh inning and allowed a run, Javier Baez homered and drove in three runs, and Chicago beat the Toronto Blue Jays 7-4 on Friday in a rare interleague matchup.

Arrieta (13-8) allowed one run and six hits in 6 1/3 innings to win his third straight start. He has allowed two earned runs or fewer and gone at least six innings in each of his seven starts since the All-Star break.

“Jake was outstanding,” Cubs manager Joe Maddon said. “Right now, maybe not as good as he was a couple of years ago, but he's pretty darn close.”

Despite going 22-6 with a 1.77 ERA in 2015, Arrieta, 31, said recently that he believes his best pitching is still to come.

“That's the way I feel and I intend to back it up,” he said.

Ryan Goins had a two-run single and Kevin Pillar added an RBI double to highlight a three-run eighth for the Blue Jays. Miguel Montero, who began the season with the Cubs, went 2 for 4 with a run scored against his former team.

This is Toronto's second visit to Wrigley Field and first since June 2005.

Blue Jays starter J.A. Happ (6-9) allowed five runs and nine hits in five innings to snap a three-game winning streak.

“It was a battle for him,” manager John Gibbons said of Happ. “He had to work in the early innings.”

After Toronto went up 1-0 in the first, the Cubs answered with three runs in the second aided by Happ's mental mistake. With runners on second and third and one out, Heyward hit a grounder wide of first base. Smoak easily fielded it, but Happ didn't break to cover and Heyward beat him to the bag for a runscoring single.