Kyle Hendricks created a lasting legacy with the Cubs

As Tommy Hottovy walked to the mound in the top of the eighth inning Saturday afternoon, Aerosmith’s “Sweet Emotion” came on the Wrigley Field speakers.

This wasn’t any old mound visit to talk strategy in the late innings of a scoreless ballgame. This was a chance for Hottovy to create a special moment with the guy who’s been a staple in the Chicago Cubs‘ rotation over the last 11 seasons: Kyle Hendricks.

Hendricks hugged Hottovy, who’s been part of the organization for basically his entire major league career (and the last six seasons as his pitching coach), when he got to the mound, then turned around and hugged the Cubs infielders. As he walked off the field, Hendricks stared up at the stands, tapped his heart and tipped his cap. The 38,180 fans in attendance responded with a roar and a standing ovation.

They kept cheering as Hendricks went into the dugout and embraced the rest of his teammates and coaches. After an extended ovation, he re-emerged onto the field, thanking the fans who’ve cheered him on since his debut over 10 years ago as he made a well-deserved curtain call.

“You feel all the emotions, man,” Hendricks said. “I just feel so lucky and just so happy. I got my whole family here today up in the stands. I’m sure they’re crying. Just for the fans to give me that from the moment I showed up to the ballpark today, kind of celebrating me. Part of me hates it. I hate all that attention, but at the end, I know I have to soak in these moments. That’s what the Wrigley fans are there for.

“They’re so special. They’re the best in the world. To play here in Wrigley Field, I’m just such a lucky guy.”

The moment really wasn’t lost on anyone in the ballpark. Considering he’ll enter free agency for the first time this winter and considering the team isn’t likely to bring him back, everyone watching had quite possibly just seen the last pitch Hendricks will ever throw in a Cubs uniform.

That on its own added so much weight to the moment. Having Hottovy be the one to go out there and take the ball after Hendricks pitched 7 1/3 scoreless innings versus the Cincinnati Reds (the same team he debuted against on July 10, 2014), reminding everyone of what he could do at his best, made it a truly beautiful thing to watch.

“He’s an unbelievable human being, he’s a great person, he’s a great competitor, he’s a good baseball player. He does all the little things right,” Hottovy told CHGO. “To see him grow and come in as the young guy that was behind [John] Lackey and [Jon] Lester and [Jake] Arrieta and some of those guys, and then just continue to be the steady Kyle and be himself, not try to be anything more than he needed to be and to continue to grow into the leader that he is.

“I mean, it’s been an amazing journey. It’s been fun to be part of, and I feel honored to be able to be a part of it, for sure.”

The thing is, the 34-year-old wasn’t always guaranteed that moment.

There were times this year when Hendricks didn’t necessarily think he’d be pitching in the penultimate game of the Cubs’ season — because he didn’t necessarily think he deserved all the opportunities the team kept giving him.

Despite his status as one of the most important arms in this organization’s history, 2024 was a lesson that it doesn’t always matter what you’ve done in the past. In a lot of ways, this is a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately game, and what Hendricks was doing at the beginning of the season wasn’t cutting it.

Seven starts into the year, Hendricks had posted a 10.57 ERA. For a team with real postseason hopes, that wasn’t good enough. It got to a point where the Cubs moved him to the bullpen for about a month starting in mid-May, hoping it could help get his season on track.

The results were better — he posted a 3.14 ERA in five relief appearances — but injuries forced him back into the rotation on June 19. It wasn’t always perfect from then on, but Hendricks did show at times — particularly in September, when he posted a 2.89 ERA in five starts — that he had something left in the tank.

That led to his last walk off the mound at Wrigley Field. Though the last few years have been a bit of a roller coaster for him — a season-ending shoulder injury halfway through ’22, a bounce-back ’23 and a struggle-filled ’24 — Hendricks persevered and got his moment Saturday, a moment he’d earned no matter when it eventually happened.

Those who’ve paid attention understand why he’s earned it. Though he hasn’t looked like “The Professor” as often in recent years, there was a long stretch of time where he was as impactful as any arm on the roster.

There’s obviously his dominant performance in Game 6 of the 2016 National League Championship Series, where he outdueled Clayton Kershaw with 7 1/3 innings of two-hit, scoreless ball at Wrigley to send the Cubs to the World Series for the first time in 71 years. He then got the start on the road in Game 7 and helped the Cubs take the World Series crown, ending their 108-year drought.

But also, think about this: 19 starting pitchers passed the 1,000-inning threshold from the day Hendricks debuted through the 2020 season (a solid accomplishment on its own); only six — Kershaw, Jacob deGrom, Max Scherzer, Corey Kluber, Zack Greinke and Justin Verlander — posted an ERA better than Hendricks’ 3.13. That group includes pitchers who were always considered among the best arms in the game.

Hendricks didn’t always get that kind of credit. He didn’t make an All-Star team with the Cubs. He didn’t win a Cy Young, though he did finish third in NL Cy Young voting in 2016, when his 2.13 ERA won him the ERA title (and even manager Craig Counsell said it’s “hard to believe that people finished ahead of him”). He was never a flashy pitcher with elite velocity or a dominant breaking ball, and maybe that worked against him as far as getting the recognition some of his peers got from the general baseball audience.

But the Cubs obviously understand what he’s meant to this ballclub.

“Ian [Happ] listed Kyle’s accomplishments as a Cub, importantly for just the rest of the group, to kind of put it in perspective,” Counsell said. “Perspective is something we all need a dose of, and I thought Ian did a fabulous job of kind of putting into perspective Kyle’s accomplishments in Major League Baseball, with the Cubs, in the playoffs, in the biggest moments of this franchise.

“He has done star things. He has done the highest of the highs and been a star for this organization, and it was fun to hear it. The perspective you get from it, it’s awe-inspiring, really.”

Understanding what he’s meant isn’t limited to what he did on the field.

Hendricks may have sometimes seemed like a robot to those watching, a guy who didn’t display much emotion on the mound. But everyone around him will tell you there was so much more to him than that. He was the consummate teammate, always willing to listen and give advice. He was the consummate professional, always willing to do whatever was asked of him to help the team win.

“He’s a perfect example of what it means to be a Chicago Cub, not only what he’s done on the field but who he is as a person, the way that he carries himself, the way that he works,” said Happ, Hendricks’ teammate for most of the last eight seasons. “It’s important in this game to honor that.”

“The person’s better than the player. And that’s hard to say, because the player’s been so impressive for so long,” Justin Steele told CHGO. “It’s just been awesome to get to know him. I have nothing but great things to say about him.”

It’s unclear what comes next for Hendricks, who is the last remaining member of the ’16 World Series team and a reminder of the highs of that era of Cubs baseball.

He plans to keep pitching (and hopes it still happens with the Cubs), and Counsell said, “You just don’t count people like Kyle out.” Whether he gets another shot, with the Cubs or with any of the other 29 MLB teams, is a question for another day.

Saturday was a day to honor someone whose accomplishments — seventh on the Cubs’ all-time strikeouts list, tied for ninth on the Cubs’ all-time games-started list and so much more — only scratch the surface in describing what he’s meant to this franchise.

His teammates know it. His coaches know it. The entire organization knows it.

And maybe most importantly, the fans showed him that they know it, too.

“I just keep going back to just feeling so lucky,” Hendricks said. “So lucky and so grateful to have gotten that much time here, to have gotten that many starts out in Wrigley Field, of putting that jersey on that many times. I just keep going back to just how many memories I’m going to have. Great memories because of Wrigley Field, because of Cubs fans and because of Chicago.”

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