4/10 Cubs (Hendricks) @ Padres (Cease) 5:40 PM

[Bertz]

1 hour ago, 1908_Cubs said:

I think two things can be true at once: we shouldn't expect 40% of his flyballs to be home runs, but that there is also an underlying issue here that needs to be figured out. His whiff rate, chase rate, weak contact rate, are all way down. His xBA and xwOBA, xERA barrel rate are all way up.  He's giving up a higher rate of no-doubt HR's than ever before. 

The lack of swing and miss is something I think is worth worrying about a bit, but the rest feels like regular ebbs and flows stuff.  

Hendricks stuff isn't down, in fact it's actually up a bit.  The velo is the best it's been since 2016, and the Stuff metrics don't go back that far but agree the stuff is up YoY.  He's not throwing more pitches down the middle, his "Meatball" rate is below his career average and his "Edge" rate is a smidge below his career number but up over last year and well above the league number.  

I would say there are three things going on here, with mileage varying on how they should be weighted:

- Horsefeathers happens.  It's just three games

- The schedule.  He faced an elite offense and two other good ones, with two of those starts on the road.  That's a tough gauntlet for anyone

- Predictability.  This is my best guess as to where something actually need to be done.  Maybe he's tipping pitches, maybe his sequencing has been too predictable, or maybe (and this is my personal guess) he needs to bump his curveball usage up to something closer to 10%.  But a lot of the worst damage this year has been done on pitches that weren't actually that bad.  Watching him, particularly yesterday, has felt like playing MLB The Show with Guess Pitch turned on

[Jason Ross]

32 minutes ago, Bertz said:

The lack of swing and miss is something I think is worth worrying about a bit, but the rest feels like regular ebbs and flows stuff.  

Hendricks stuff isn't down, in fact it's actually up a bit.  The velo is the best it's been since 2016, and the Stuff metrics don't go back that far but agree the stuff is up YoY.  He's not throwing more pitches down the middle, his "Meatball" rate is below his career average and his "Edge" rate is a smidge below his career number but up over last year and well above the league number.  

I would say there are three things going on here, with mileage varying on how they should be weighted:

- Horsefeathers happens.  It's just three games

- The schedule.  He faced an elite offense and two other good ones, with two of those starts on the road.  That's a tough gauntlet for anyone

- Predictability.  This is my best guess as to where something actually need to be done.  Maybe he's tipping pitches, maybe his sequencing has been too predictable, or maybe (and this is my personal guess) he needs to bump his curveball usage up to something closer to 10%.  But a lot of the worst damage this year has been done on pitches that weren't actually that bad.  Watching him, particularly yesterday, has felt like playing MLB The Show with Guess Pitch turned on

I don't necessarily think Hendricks has to be throwing meatballs to be missing locations. He's not throwing meatballs, but he's catching a lot more of the plate. 

The left is 2024, the right is 2023. There's been a shift where the stuff off the plate is coming much much closer to the plate. His stuff has always been "fringey", but has played well up due to command and control. I think the margins for error here are a lot slimmer. So even when he's throwing pitches that "aren't that bad"...they're far more hittable than others who throw "not that bad". Particularly, look at that splotch on the bottom right in the 2024 box; that's a hittable area. And he's missing far more middle-plate that before. There's a reason his changeup has gone from a +12 to a -4 in run value right now.

This isn't to say this isn't fixable, but I think I'm more concerned about this than you are. There are some things like "it's three games" and "he's faced good teams" but there's also the "holy horsefeathers this isn't just a normal amount of bad" that you look at, at the totality of things to a degree. I think there's a good chance this is a mechanical fix, but as stated, I think that it's fair to wonder about a 34 year old's decline in ability to command/control as well. I really don't want to be panic-mode...I think on the continuum from "panic" to "everything is going to be fine" I'm far more in the middle of "I will wait and see" than you. Which is fine, IMO, as I think as long as you're stopping short of panic right now, you're probably in a fine territory when it comes to Hendricks

[UMFan83]

2 minutes ago, 1908_Cubs said:

I don't necessarily think Hendricks has to be throwing meatballs to be missing locations. He's not throwing meatballs, but he's catching a lot more of the plate. 

The left is 2024, the right is 2023. There's been a shift where the stuff off the plate is coming much much closer to the plate. His stuff has always been "fringey", but has played well up due to command and control. I think the margins for error here are a lot slimmer. So even when he's throwing pitches that "aren't that bad"...they're far more hittable than others who throw "not that bad". Particularly, look at that splotch on the bottom right in the 2024 box; that's a hittable area. And he's missing far more middle-plate that before. There's a reason his changeup has gone from a +12 to a -4 in run value right now.

This isn't to say this isn't fixable, but I think I'm more concerned about this than you are. There are some things like "it's three games" and "he's faced good teams" but there's also the "holy horsefeathers this isn't just a normal amount of bad" that you look at, at the totality of things to a degree. I think there's a good chance this is a mechanical fix, but as stated, I think that it's fair to wonder about a 34 year old's decline in ability to command/control as well. I really don't want to be panic-mode...I think on the continuum from "panic" to "everything is going to be fine" I'm far more in the middle of "I will wait and see" than you. Which is fine, IMO, as I think as long as you're stopping short of panic right now, you're probably in a fine territory when it comes to Hendricks

Thanks for this breakdown.  I understand that at his age its possible his command is faltering due to decline, but I can also recall times in the past when Kyle's command has faltered for a stretch and he's been able to correct it during the season.  Has the movement/spin rate of his pitches also declined?  Looking at those charts its alarming how off his command is, but hoping that the lack of velocity drop off is a sign that it's correctable.

[Jason Ross]

3 minutes ago, UMFan83 said:

Thanks for this breakdown.  I understand that at his age its possible his command is faltering due to decline, but I can also recall times in the past when Kyle's command has faltered for a stretch and he's been able to correct it during the season.  Has the movement/spin rate of his pitches also declined?  Looking at those charts its alarming how off his command is, but hoping that the lack of velocity drop off is a sign that it's correctable.

Stuff wise he's been fine as @Bertzpointed out. This is really a command/control issue, IMO. He's not piping pitches but that command is leaking to more and more hittable areas. The hope is that this is a 2021/2022 mechanical fix where the command can be re-found, and Hendricks can look more like the guy in 2023. With that said, I do believe command/control is a skill that can decline as well. If it's decline, than I fear Hendricks may have a very sharp cliff. If it's mechanical, there probably aren't many more minds out there on the mound more in tune with what they need to do to maximize their stuff than Hendricks. The hope is that it's the second, my fear is that there's going to come a point when it becomes more likely it's the first and how much rope he'll get would then become a factor.

[Stratos]

2 hours ago, Bertz said:

I don't think there's any reason to expect 40% of flyballs to leave the yard.  With Kyle's unique velocity never say never but he's probably fine.

Hopefully he's just getting weird Craig Kimbrel type results now.   You're right he's not going to keep up that pace for HR.  He has a 12 ERA but 4.36 xFIP.

[Stratos]

52 minutes ago, Bertz said:

The lack of swing and miss is something I think is worth worrying about a bit, but the rest feels like regular ebbs and flows stuff.  

Hendricks stuff isn't down, in fact it's actually up a bit.  The velo is the best it's been since 2016, and the Stuff metrics don't go back that far but agree the stuff is up YoY.  He's not throwing more pitches down the middle, his "Meatball" rate is below his career average and his "Edge" rate is a smidge below his career number but up over last year and well above the league number.  

I would say there are three things going on here, with mileage varying on how they should be weighted:

- Horsefeathers happens.  It's just three games

- The schedule.  He faced an elite offense and two other good ones, with two of those starts on the road.  That's a tough gauntlet for anyone

- Predictability.  This is my best guess as to where something actually need to be done.  Maybe he's tipping pitches, maybe his sequencing has been too predictable, or maybe (and this is my personal guess) he needs to bump his curveball usage up to something closer to 10%.  But a lot of the worst damage this year has been done on pitches that weren't actually that bad.  Watching him, particularly yesterday, has felt like playing MLB The Show with Guess Pitch turned on

I think a 3rd effective pitch for him would go a long way and keep the guess hitters off a bit.  

[chibears55]

We wont have to worry about Hendricks for awhile,  he was put on IL with Shoulder inflammation 

[Rcal10]

10 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

We wont have to worry about Hendricks for awhile,  he was put on IL with Shoulder inflammation 

Maybe Tailon comes up one start early. Brown stays in the rotation. 

[UMFan83]

So our rotation right now is Imanaga, Wicks, Assad, Brown, Pray for rain

[squally1313]

20 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

We wont have to worry about Hendricks for awhile,  he was put on IL with Shoulder inflammation 

source?

[Crusader]

This is purely observational, and I haven't looked at the numbers to see if it’s backed up, but I feel like Kyle’s biggest issue right now is that he isn’t throwing his curveball for a strike. If he could, it would start forcing hitters to adjust their eye level, and he’ll have more success sneaking a fastball at the top of the zone, which in turn makes his change up more effective.

[WhyCantWeWin]

this is the tweet I think he’s talking about. But I have no idea who this is

[Transmogrified Tiger]

That guy is making a joke that he would be put on the IL given his performance, not sharing a thing that happened. It's timestamped to the middle of the game yesterday.

[WhyCantWeWin]

2 minutes ago, Transmogrified Tiger said:

That guy is making a joke that he would be put on the IL given his performance, not sharing a thing that happened. It's timestamped to the middle of the game yesterday.

Yeah seems like it, chibears probably saw this article that referenced that tweet

https://www.si.com/mlb/cubs/news/chicago-cubs-world-series-veteran-placed-on-il-again-dylan9

 

 

[squally1313]

5 minutes ago, WhyCantWeWin said:

Yeah seems like it, chibears probably saw this article that referenced that tweet

https://www.si.com/mlb/cubs/news/chicago-cubs-world-series-veteran-placed-on-il-again-dylan9

 

 

Yep, from Sports Illustrated....pretty bleak!

[Rcal10]

33 minutes ago, WhyCantWeWin said:

Yeah seems like it, chibears probably saw this article that referenced that tweet

https://www.si.com/mlb/cubs/news/chicago-cubs-world-series-veteran-placed-on-il-again-dylan9

 

 

So no IL stint? Honestly they need Hendricks to do better. But losing him would have really thinned an already thin rotation and pen. When Taillon comes back I am hoping either Assad or Brown can help the pen. For 3 innings yesterday Hendricks did look good. Then he fell apart. They got 2 in the second with the hardest hit ball at 72 mph. But in the 4th and especially the 6th he was toast. 

[chibears55]

2 hours ago, squally1313 said:

source?

Starting to doubt it cause I haven't seen it elsewhere..

Sports Illustrated

[Jason Ross]

16 minutes ago, chibears55 said:

Starting to doubt it cause I haven't seen it elsewhere..

Sports Illustrated

1. That's not 'really' Sports Illustrated. That's FanNation, something similar to Bleacher Report. It's far less trustworthy. FanNation is just "a part" of the SI Network. 

2. That article is written by a Marlins' "beat writer". Probably not very acclimated with the Cubs. 

3. SI has gone through huge layoffs recently thus why someone who covers the Marlins is covering the Cubs. They run a skeleton crew. This is barely the SI you knew. It also explains #4

4. The only "source" is the joke tweet from Sports Mockery. Likely fooled a Marlins beat who isn't following the correct Cubs sources.

5. Here is Alden Soto, the same person with the original tweet, with a follow up:

It's not real. Hendricks is not on the IL.

[Stratos]

11 hours ago, Bertz said:

The lack of swing and miss is something I think is worth worrying about a bit, but the rest feels like regular ebbs and flows stuff.

.429 BABIP and 39% HR/FB and a 12.08 ERA, that won't continue obviously.  4.36 xFIP so let's hope he's closer to that.  I'm thinking 4.30 to 4.60 ERA, even before the season that was my expectation.  His projections were bad, 4.70 ERA.

[chibears55]

Good news on an off day..

 

https://twitter.com/CubsZone/status/1778587784631947337?t=N_E2aoZejRfFPtLeIbFBzA&s=19

[Derwood]

BN reporting that the Cubs are considering taking away Kyle calling his own pitches. 

[WhyCantWeWin]

26 minutes ago, Derwood said:

BN reporting that the Cubs are considering taking away Kyle calling his own pitches. 

Isn’t is his issue location of pitches? Idk how that would help

[LBiittner]

14 hours ago, chibears55 said:

Good news on an off day..

 

https://twitter.com/CubsZone/status/1778587784631947337?t=N_E2aoZejRfFPtLeIbFBzA&s=19

Hmm. nelson velazquez has hit 16 homer's in 50 games with KC. 

Cuas probably allows 16 homer's in 50 games

[Transmogrified Tiger]

51 minutes ago, Derwood said:

BN reporting that the Cubs are considering taking away Kyle calling his own pitches. 

Doesn't sound like it's that stark, more of a 'let the catchers shake off Kyle if they see something in particular'

Quote

One thing that might change, per Jordan Bastian at Cubs.com, a little more give-and-take with his catchers. Starting last season, Hendricks has been calling his own game via PitchCom. And obviously, for a veteran and extremely intelligent and prepared pitcher like Hendricks, that’s fine. But everyone seems to agree it might be time to start soliciting some more feedback from his catchers during games: That’s already been in the discussions, too,” Hendricks said. “Even if I am calling stuff, have them giving me more feedback. If they really want something, and they see me — if I’m getting predictable — yeah, help me out some more there. It needs to be, definitely, a better relationship there and not all on me."