Sometimes Kyle Hendricks wonders if his career would have turned out differently. What would have happened had he never donned the Chicago Cubs pinstripes?
Cubs starter Kyle Hendricks delivers to the Milwaukee Brewers in the first inning at Wrigley Field on June 1, 2022.What would have happened had he never donned the Chicago Cubs pinstripes?“It could have never worked out, obviously,” Hendricks told the Tribune. “Sometimes you see it with guys that get stuck or sometimes you just don’t get the opportunity depending on where a team is at in their process. And then your career life span could basically be over by then and your time is kind of up.
In the lead-up to news of a trade with the Atlanta Braves eight days before the deadline, Epstein, then the president of baseball operations, informed Dempster the Braves were very interested. Epstein asked the veteran to weigh and process a potential trade because the Braves weren’t going to wait forever for an answer.
Said Dempster recently: “I just felt forced into it. There was this immense pressure and I still had personal family things that I was going through to try to figure it out. And it just felt like it wasn’t the best fit for me.” Epstein and Hoyer wanted Dempster nearby as they worked to complete a trade as the hours and minutes ticked down. And that meant a unique setup by putting him down the hall in an office with a TV on which speculation about his destination was being discussed in real time.
Said Hoyer in 2012: “We talked a lot about keeping him, but ultimately he’s a free agent and we felt like the right thing to do was to keep adding talent to the farm system. We said a number of times that we don’t have enough depth in the system and good young players. Now we have a chance to add two guys we like a lot. We took that chance.”
“If it were left up to me, shame on me because I had just an OK report,” Wilken said. “I didn’t have an overwhelming ‘acquire him.’ I would have taken him in a deal, but I probably didn’t give him enough credit, control-wise and command. I still had plus on him, but I think I was a little shy on that.”
Hendricks wasn’t the top player the Cubs received in the trade. That honor went to Villanueva, rated Baseball America’s No. 100 prospect and No. 12 in the Rangers farm system entering the 2012 season. “I think the Cubs were really perceptive because they saw something here,” Cooper said. “At the time if you told me, ‘Hey, there’s this pitcher. He doesn’t throw all that particularly hard. He’s never in his career been a strikeout-a-batter-an-inning pitcher after that first season in the Northwest League as a reliever. He’ll never do that again, ever. And oh, by the way, he’s going to be a really good big-league starter.’ I probably wouldn’t have believed it.
When they entered, Rangers GM Jon Daniels was on the phone to inform Hendricks and Villanueva of the trade and laid out the situation. Oneri Fleita, then the Cubs vice president of player personnel, told both players they would report to High-A Daytona. Because Hendricks already had thrown 130⅔ innings for Myrtle Beach, the Cubs wanted to limit him to roughly 20 innings over the final month.“It was kind of a weird time because it was this huge change,” Hendricks said.
Hendricks opened 2013 at Double-A Tennessee. A stellar July capped a strong four-month stretch that produced a 1.85 ERA in 21 starts and earned him a promotion to Triple-A Iowa. He posted a 2.48 ERA in six starts there to close out his first full season in the Cubs organization. Chicago Cubs starter Kyle Hendricks delivers to the Cincinnati Reds in the second inning at Wrigley Field, September 17, 2014.
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