Chicago Cubs: Kyle Hendricks has put up some truly shocking numbers

Kyle Hendricks had been one of, if not the most underrated pitchers in the National League over the last five years or so. From 2016 to 2020, he had pitched to a 3.00 ERA, 3.60 FIP, 1.094 WHIP and 1.9 BB/9 in 787 innings pitched. He had never had a FIP over 3.88 and an ERA over 3.46 over those five years.

In 2016, Hendricks won the league ERA title (2.13) and finished third in National league Cy Young voting. This year, however, he is struggling mightily and will finish with far and away his worst season in the majors. What is going on with the Cubs’ two-time Opening Day starter?

After another ugly start in Philadelphia Thursday night, Hendricks raised his season numbers to a 4.81 ERA, 4.92 FIP, 1.4 WHIP and 10.0 H/9 in 30 starts. This is not just a little off for Hendricks, this is lightyears away from what we’ve seen. His career-worst ERA previously was 3.95 in 2015 and his highest FIP was 3.88 in 2017.

Thursday’s seven earned runs charged to Hendricks was the fifth time he surrendered 7+ earned runs in a start this season. He had done that only twice in his entire career prior to this year. In terms of seven runs (earned and unearned) surrendered, he had done that four times in his career prior to 2021. So regardless of whether we’re talking earned or unearned, he has surpassed his career total of seven-run starts in just one season. That’s insane.

This season, Hendricks has given up a league-leading 190 hits, 29 of which have left the ballpark. His previous season-high in hits and home runs given up was 184 and 22, all coming in 33 starts in 2018. In terms of what kind of batted balls are getting hit in terms of grounders, flyballs and line drives, those are all around the same as his career numbers.

His grounder percentage is slightly down to 42.2 percent in 2021 against a career mark of 46.7 percent, but none of the batted ball types are drastically off. The contact numbers against are also very similar. 81.5 percent of swings against Hendricks have produced contact, compare that to his career contact rate of 79.6. Even with his K/9 down at 6.5 percent, the overall contact rate on swings is not drastically off. It is more the quality of contact and where the balls are falling.

Statcast reveals a lot about how batters are making contact against Hendricks. In 2021 he has surrendered 45 barrels (a batted ball comparable hit type that leads to a minimum .500 average and 1.500 slugging based on launch angle and exit velocity), which accounts for 8 percent of batted balls against. His previous high in a season was 31 barrels (5.2 percent) in 2018. He has also tied his career-high in HardHit balls (balls hit 95 MPH+) at 183 with a few more starts to go.

Overall hitters have a .281/.335/.478 slash against him – good for an .813 OPS. Never before in a season did hitters have an OBP against above .300 or an OPS above .700.

Chicago Cubs: What to make of things going forward with Kyle Hendricks

It is really weird seeing how bad things have been for Hendricks when it can be hard to pinpoint what exactly the problem is. The velocity on his pitches has not dipped, the Active Spin Percentage compared to last year is not really different, it just seems to be execution. Hendricks was quoted by Chicago Sun-Times Cubs beat reporter Russell Dorsey,

"“Mechanically, I still feel good at certain points. I just get out of it, timing-wise. But really the moral of the story is too many bad pitches.”"

The command overall is not awful by any means, but it is not quite as sharp. At times it feels like there is a lot of nibbling around the zone which can lead to eventually putting it over the heart of the plate. He just might not be executing the way he wants to and the simple answer he gave is indeed the problem. Hendricks is the type of guy where the margin for error is very small because he uses location and changing speeds to get outs, and not high velocity. So when something is slightly off, things can go off the rails.

We have seen Hendricks have a few mediocre stretches in past seasons, but he always worked his way out of it. Feels like this year he works out of issues, then it creeps back after a few solid starts.

Hendricks might just be having a bad season, and can work it out in 2022. He might also be on a decline…which is hopefully not the case. One cannot help but wonder how long a crafty guy like Hendricks can last in modern baseball where there is more study on the game than ever.

While I do not want to lose all confidence in Hendricks, I think the Cubs need to reevaluate where he fits in the rotation in 2022 and beyond. It is hard to have an ace with such little margin for error in his game in this day and age.