4. Kyle Hendricks Wins The NL CY Young Award
Hendricks was a finalist for the 2016 CY Young after an outstanding season and 2017 sets up to be his best season yet. He finished 2016 16-8 with a microscopic ERA of 2.13 and an even smaller WHIP of .98. Even though the CY Young voters did not give him the award, the players in the NL recognized his dominance when they voted Hendricks as the Most Outstanding NL Pitcher during the Player Choice Awards last year.
Only in the Cubs organization can you lead the league in ERA and still be the fifth starter on your team as Hendricks found out about a week ago. The reason given was the Cubs wanted to break the staff up between right-handed pitchers and left-handed pitchers and with the newly acquired lefty Brett Anderson getting the nod as a starter, Hendricks was bumped to fifth to break up the two lefties in the rotation (Lester and Anderson).
The silver lining of Hendricks pitching fifth is that spot in the rotation will allow him to face the opposing team’s fifth starter (most of the time). The potent Cubs offense should have a field day with another team’s number five pitcher so putting up runs should never be a problem during any of Hendricks’ starts this season.
If he can replicate his 2016 numbers and follow through on the wish of his manager to reach 200 innings for the first time in his career, there could be a very pretty award waiting for Hendricks at the end of the season.
