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Look, Cubs newcomer Shota Imanaga brought this upon himself.
Imanaga, 30, has been so obscenely good since arriving from Japan, we have no choice but to compare him with giant pitching names present and past.
The lefty starter is 5-0 with a miniscule 0.84 ERA, the fourth-lowest after the first nine starts of a season since ERA became an official statistic in — come on, you know you remember it — 1913. The last to go lower nine starts in was Jacob deGrom, at 0.62 in 2021, when he was well on his way to a third Cy Young award before his season was cut short in July.