Kyle Hendricks made his big league debut last season and was rather impressive in 13 starts. Hendricks was 7-2 with a 2.46 ERA, 1.08 WHIP and 3.32 FIP. Hendricks gave up 24 runs, 22 earned, on 72 hits with 47 strikeouts and 15 walks.
If everything goes as planned this spring, Hendricks should slot in behind Jon Lester, Jake Arrieta and Jason Hammel in the Cubs rotation.
Kyle Hendricks spent time Friday night with Jeff Joyce and Steve Sax on MLB Roundtrip (MLB Network Radio) and talked Cubs, pitching and his time in the big leagues last season.
On how his off-season has been
“It’s been awesome so far. The first thing in the off-season is spending time with family, just laying low and resting up. But now around this time we’ve been working out. I’ve been on my throwing program. It’s time to start cranking it up and getting ready for Spring Training.”
His thoughts on the Cubs signing Jon Lester
“There have been many deals done so far this off-season. Everyone, there not all like that [Jon Lester] obviously, but they’ve all been very exciting. I keep in touch with a lot of the guys. We all played together last year with the team. The excitement level for everyone is just through the roof. You can clearly tell that they are trying to do something here. I’m just happy to hopefully be a part of it. Looking forward to see what we can do.”
On if he had a feeling going into the off-season the team was about to do something big
“I think there was limited buzz to be honest. We knew we had a lot of young talent and the young guys performed pretty well actually when a lot of us came up. There was excitement around that but we weren’t quite sure what was going to happen. Once all of these pieces started falling, I mean it was pretty evident that obviously the front office thinks that there’s enough young talent ready to compete.”
On if he slots into the fourth spot in the rotation and does the attention the other prospects, like Jorge Soler, Arismendy Alcantara and Javier Baez, receive allow him to settle in and go unnoticed
“Yeah, I definitely think so. That’s something that I’ve always strived with or has success with, I guess, also. Because coming up through the system I wasn’t the guy throwing high-90s. I didn’t have nasty stuff. I’ve always kind of flown under the radar and that’s just what I’m used to. We definitely have a lot of talent and really, really good talent on this team and that’s what the buzz is around and the hype is about. Me personally, I think I can definitely take advantage of that, fly under the radar and hopefully settle in and have a good year.”
On if there was one start that stood out to him last year after he was called up
“My first couple of starts, that’s always a little bit of a shock and you’re trying to get your feet wet and figure out how to do everything, how to go about your business up at that level. So after I got some sort comfortability I think the Dodger game I would have to say the one I remember. I am from the area. I am from Southern California. So we came out to L.A. and I got to pitch one of those games. I had a bunch of family, bunch of friends there to see it. Luckily I was able to pitch well and win. I think that would be the one game where I was like ‘Wow that was pretty awesome.’ And now I know what I can do because it was obviously one of the best lineups in baseball. That was a big turning point for me.”
On some of the things he’s learned since being called up to the majors and what he’s been working on this off-season
“I think one of the biggest things I learned is even at that level you just need to stay true to yourself. Stay true to who you are as a pitcher, as a position player. Whatever your game is, whatever has brought you success up to that point, it can still bring you success at that level if you are willing to stick to it. As far as over the off-season what I’m working on, is just that same thing. Just trying to get your arm feeling good, get back into that mid-season form per say as quick as you can so you’re feeling good and ready to go for Spring Training. It’s just working on all of your pitches, getting the consistency. Consistency has always been a big thing for me. Just making sure all of my pitches are ready and consistent going into the year.”
On if he used to throw a little harder in college (95 mph on fastball) and was it a conscious decision to back of the velocity to gain a little more control
“I could get it up to 95 mph, like you said back in college. I don’t know if it was necessarily a conscious decision to lose velocity like that but one thing that I did try and work on was just movement. My two-seam fastball, establishing that, throwing a cutter, that’s been something the last couple of years only I’ve been throwing. Once I started sinking and cutting the ball more it’s one of those things where you almost forget how to get your fingers behind the baseball in the four-seam. So you do decrease velocity somewhat. But for me it wasn’t part of my game anyway. I still can get it up there, not to 95, but when I want to get one up there I can throw low-90s, 93-94, depending. But in my game I figured out to be successful I need to be able to sink it and cut it so that’s just what I’ve stuck with.”
On if he’s had a chance to speak with Joe Maddon
“Honestly I haven’t. I haven’t had the chance to talk to him. I haven’t had a phone call with him. But we have the Cubs Convention coming up, starting a week Friday, so a week from today. He’s going to be there and I’ll be flying out there on Wednesday so I should be able to meet him and hopefully get some time to just get to know him a little bit and talk to him.”
On if he switched from throwing a slider to throwing a cutter
“Exactly. I threw a curveball and a slider when I first started coming up. The curveball it was okay, I still don’t want to throw it too much, but it’s a good weapon for me and I knew that it was going to be better for me than the slider I was throwing at the time. One of the pitching coaches I had coming up we decided collectively it would be smarter to start learning how to throw a cutter. It was going to be easier to throw, easier to control and then I would also have my curveball. So, yeah that was definitely something I changed in my game.”
On how much importance does he put on just pounding the strike zone and getting ahead of the hitters and what percentage of the time does he pitch backwards
“Well, for the first part I think pitching ahead in the count is by far the most important thing I try and do out on the mound. That’s just establishing your aggressiveness. You’ve got to try and get the hitters on their heels as much as you can and you do that by throwing strikes and not being afraid and going right at them. At the same time, you’re not just throwing a strike. You want to make a good quality pitch. That would be the first part. And then the second part, pitching backwards is something just depending on the hitter to be honest. There are a lot of guys, I watch a lot of video. I try and breakdown, get a game plan going in for certain guys. There are certain guys where I look and see okay I think pitching backwards is going to benefit me with this guy but you can’t do that every at bat as you guys well know. There are definitely certain guys you look at and you can see that you can pitch them backwards.”
On Miguel Montero and if he will reach out to the pitchers before Spring Training since he is new to the team
“Spring Training is definitely going to be that time. Like I said we have that convention coming up. He’ll be there also, so that will be a time to just meet and get to know a little bit of all the new guys, him being included. Like you said Spring Training is a spot where you are there every single day and you’re getting ready for the season so every single day it’s going to be getting that relationship because you know how important that is to have a good relationship with your catcher for pitching staffs. That will definitely be a big emphasis for us.”
On the Sporting News picking the Cubs to win The World Series
“Honestly I didn’t know that but I know there are expectations like I said with these signings. All it does for us is it grows the excitement. We don’t see the expectation. We don’t look at it in that sense. We know we have a lot of young guys and they are bringing in these veterans. I really hope and I really do believe that we are going to be able to mold and have great teammates and great relationships with guys and I think we are going to be able to win a lot of ballgames this year.”
On as a young pitcher in the majors if he shakes off a catcher or just goes with what is called, how does he balance the two since he’s new to the league
“Yeah, that’s a tough thing because you have to know your catcher but you don’t want to step on anybody’s toes or make them think that they are calling the wrong game or they don’t know what they are doing. But at the same time you need to stay true to yourself because you know yourself the best and you know what you need to be throwing. I was lucky to get two great catchers in Wely [Welington Castillo] and Bake [John Baker] and the relationships we had were amazing. They trusted me full-fledged, 100 percent right out of the gate. I went in there, honestly and threw what I wanted to throw. But that’s one thing where you’re talking to catchers again. I would talk to them a lot and get them familiarized with my game plan and what I wanted to do to certain hitters. So honestly I was out there on the mound and they knew what I wanted to because I had talked to them beforehand, so there wasn’t too much shaking off because of that. It’s definitely a mutual thing even when you come up as a rookie because they know that you know what you want to throw because you made it there for a reason.”
On playing with the prospects in the Cubs system
“It’s just unbelievable talent to be honest. One guy, Kris Bryant, I know everyone talks about, but he is definitely one of the best hitters I’ve ever played with personally. Not to put any pressure on him. All of these other guys [Javier] Baez, [Arismendy] Alcantara, [Jorge] Soler, there are so many young guys that are so exciting because of their power it’s just all of these raw tools they have but at the end of the day all of these guys are also great baseball players. They know the game. They have great instincts and I think that’s almost the stuff that you can’t teach and that’s something that all of these guys have which I think will get them to the next level and be very, very, very good.”
On if he relied on the scouting reports last year or just his raw stuff
“I dove deep into the scouting reports right away when I got up there. That was something coming up through the minor leagues I would even watch video but it was limited what they had available for us. There was enough where I would be able to look and scout certain hitters before I would go out there in the minor leagues. Once I got up, the scouting reports that are available to us were just unbelievable and all of the information that is available. It’s something that I need in my game and I know I need to know and have a game plan against the hitters that I’m going to be facing so it was something that I bought into right away when I got up.”
On if he can remember during a course of a game pitch sequences to hitters or the last time he faced a certain hitter
“100 percent, 100 percent. Like I said you make those game plans about guys and so when you are that prepared and that ready you sear it into your memory almost. You remember pretty much every pitch you throw guys for a while even for a couple of games ago I could remember how I pitched him or something. I think it’s something you almost have to be good at because it’s a game of adjustments and you’ve got to be able to remember what you did, maybe what he’s looking for this at bat, if he’s adjusting to you. You just have to make sure you can make adjustments quicker than the hitters.”
On being an economics major at Dartmouth and how much advice his teammates ask for help
“[laughs] They don’t ask ever actually to be honest which is probably a good thing. I loved going there and going to that school but I’m glad to be where I’m at, definitely playing baseball now.”
On what was tougher, getting a degree in economics or making it to the Major Leagues
“That’s a good question. I think the fact that I even have to think about it that much, getting that degree was very difficult. All of the classes I had to go through and signing after my junior year I had to go back twice to campus to try and graduate and that is a very difficult thing to do, even in itself is to go back and commit and to want to graduate. It was very difficult but making it to the Major Leagues, it’s one of the hardest things to do. I would have to go with that.”