With Cubs' pitching lab in high gear, Hendricks shuts down Tigers
With Cubs starters posting the worst ERA in the majors so far, there's been plenty of talk this week about whether it's time to add one of the young guys, like Keegan Thompson or Justin Steele, to the rotation.
There was no need Sunday, since vintage Kyle Hendricks took the mound in Detroit. He efficiently mowed down the Tigers to earn a 5-1 victory.
Hendricks ended up throwing 105 pitches and attempted the complete-game shutout, but left after giving up a pair of singles to open the ninth inning. Dan Winkler finished the game and the Tigers scored their lone run after replay overturned a game-ending double play.
Hendricks got off to the worst start of his big-league career, but has now been very good in two of his last three starts.
"It's been feeling better for the last week and a half maybe," Hendricks said. "I think I just did so much better job moving it in and out, changing speeds and staying out of the middle of the plate. I just made a lot more good pitches today, felt so much more like myself."
There's been more attention on Cubs' prospects, because there's been so much evidence of improvement in pitcher development. Thompson, Steele, Adbert Alzolay and Jason Adam are all examples of players who learned and refined new pitches at the Cubs' South Bend alternate site last summer, while the minor leagues were on pandemic hiatus.
"Craig Breslow took over our pitching department and has done wonders," manager David Ross said. "I think the guys underneath him all have input and do a phenomenal job. You saw some of that pitch shaping and pitch characteristic stuff playing out in spring training.
"I would give a lot of credit to Craig and kind of changing the infrastructure of the pitching here and focusing a little more on pitch-shaping and velocity."
Breslow, 40, has an interesting background. He graduated from Yale with degrees molecular physics and biochemistry, then put off medical school at NYU to pursue a pitching career. While pitching for seven different teams during a 12-year MLB career, Breslow was dubbed, "The smartest man in baseball."
When his playing career ended in 2018 on a minor-league deal with Toronto, fellow Yale grad Theo Epstein hired Breslow for the Cubs front office.
With the minor leagues back in business, Ross said the South Bend pitching lab has mostly been shut down.
"We can't just move it," Ross said. "It's a lot of high-tech stuff, it's not in a suitcase. If somebody really needs to go work on something, we'll send them to Arizona first. That's the best lab we have. Last year we had some stuff set up in South Bend. I don't know if that's still there. That was kind of a makeshift lab."
The Cubs obviously need Hendricks to pitch well, especially after Ross went to his bullpen in the third inning during Saturday's 10-inning loss. Hendricks scattered 8 hits and walked no one on Sunday.
Ian Happ was the offensive star. He scored the first run by hustling around from second base on a near-double play that Kris Bryant beat out at first. Happ doubled home Matt Duffy in the third to make it 2-0, and hit a solo homer for the Cubs' final run.
Switch-hitter Happ did all that batting right-handed against Detroit lefty Matthew Boyd. Traditionally, Happ is stronger from the left side. His career home run count is now 54 from the left and 11 from the right.
Before the game, the Cubs placed pitcher Alec Mills on the injured list with a lower back strain and called up right-hander Tommy Nance. Nance, 30, had Tommy John surgery at the end of his college career and went undrafted, but pitched for the independent Windy City ThunderBolts and was signed by the Cubs in 2016. He'll be looking to make his major-league debut this week.
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