Cubs’ Kyle Hendricks to throw bullpen in Chicago to hone mechanics

Hendricks has made two rehab starts in Triple-A.

SHARE Cubs’ Kyle Hendricks to throw bullpen in Chicago to hone mechanics
Cubs right-hander Kyle Hendricks’ is scheduled to throw a bullpen in Chicago to continue to hone his mechanics.

Cubs right-hander Kyle Hendricks’ is scheduled to throw a bullpen in Chicago to continue to hone his mechanics.

John Antonoff/For the Sun-Times

WASHINGTON — Right-hander Kyle Hendricks is scheduled to throw a bullpen in Chicago to continue to hone his mechanics. 

Hendricks (strained right shoulder) has made two rehab starts in Triple-A Iowa with mixed results. But teams don’t put much stock in those stats. Manager David Ross said Hendricks felt good in his last start and had “no issues with the shoulder.” 

The Cubs, though, noticed some tweaks they want to make, reinforcing the work Hendricks has done to shorten his arm path and add athleticism to his delivery. 

“We’ve got this timeline of, yes, getting Kyle back healthy,” Cubs assistant pitching coach Daniel Moskos told the Sun-Times, “but a runway to work on some things, where you don’t necessarily always have that window when you’re an established starter.” 

The Cubs hope that the changes, which they started implementing when Hendricks was rehabbing at the spring-training complex in Arizona last fall, will help him rebound from his dip in production the last couple years and maintain his health.

They anticipated that mechanics could slip in a game setting, as the velocity ticked up and the focus shifted to getting outs.  

“It was a lot of the same stuff,” Moskos said. “Just continuing to iron out the details and make the good reps more common and the bad reps less common, and try and build on the aggregate there.”

Roster moves

To make room for right-hander Jameson Taillon (strained left groin) to be activated off the 15-day injured list to start Thursday, the Cubs optioned reliever Jeremiah Estrada to Triple-A Iowa. 

In a procedural move, they recalled right-hander Adrian Sampson and put him on the 15-day injured list with a right meniscus injury. Sampson hasn’t pitched since April 8 in Triple-A.  

The Latest
Glass-facade buildings can disorient birds in flight. The city is expected to update and revise rules for new developments and rehabbed buildings next month. But bird groups say the proposed guidelines need to be mandatory.
The man was shot in the left eye area in the 5700 block of South Christiana Avenue on the city’s Southwest Side.
Most women who seek abortions are women of color, especially Black women. Restricting access to mifepristone, as a case now before the Supreme Court seeks to do, would worsen racial health disparities.
The Bears have spent months studying the draft. They’ll spend the next one plotting what could happen.
Woman is getting anxious about how often she has to host her husband’s hunting buddy and his wife, who don’t contribute at all to mealtimes.