As tentatively expected, Yu Darvish and Kyle Hendricks have now wrapped up their seasons with the Cubs out of postseason contention.
Darvish finishes his year with a 3.98 ERA over 178.2 innings, with great peripherals and folks expecting big things next year. Hendricks led the Cubs’ staff with a 3.46 ERA over 177.0 innings.
More on the Cubs’ rotation as a whole, and its performance this year, after the season wraps.
As for who does take the ball this weekend in St. Louis, it’ll be quality fill-in-man Alec Mills, and Cole Hamels returning to get one more shot to right the ship before the offseason:
Mills Friday, Hamels Saturday, TBD Sunday. Darvish and Hendricks are done.
— Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) September 26, 2019
For Hamels, 35, the start is an opportunity to go out on a high note after a second half was thoroughly soured by an oblique injury that not only cost him time, but pretty clearly blew up his mechanics. He was recently shut down with shoulder fatigue.
Hamels season numbers don’t look terrible (his 3.92 ERA is about 11% better than league average), but that’s entirely on the strength of an excellent first three months (2.92 ERA over 98.2 innings).