CHICAGO _ Kyle Hendricks' late-season surge might be too late for National League Cy Young Award consideration, but the crafty right-hander is pitching the Chicago Cubs closer to a division title.
In one of his most dominant performances of the year, Hendricks struck out a season-high 10 while limiting the Minnesota Twins to three hits over eight innings Friday as the Cubs held on for a 1-0 victory at Wrigley Field.
The Cubs won their fifth straight and trimmed their magic number for winning the NL Central to six, thanks to the recent pitching of Hendricks.
Relying on an array of pitches that floated to all quadrants of the strike zone, Hendricks improved to 3-0 with a 1.21 ERA over his last four starts. He retired 19 of the last 20 batters after Jake Cave hit a single with one out in the second. Hendricks also induced seven groundouts.
Hendricks (6-4) has lowered his ERA from 4.09 to 2.93 during this four-game span. His 10 strikeouts were one more than his opening-day start, when he pitched a 3-0 shutout against the Milwaukee Brewers.
Jeremy Jeffress earned his eighth save.
The Cubs scored their lone run in the first when Anthony Rizzo, batting leadoff for the second time this season, drew a walk, stole second and scored on a Willson Contreras single.
Contreras continued his strong defensive season by throwing out Cave on a steal attempt with one out in the second, marking Contreras' seventh victim. Hendricks retired the next 12 batters until Josh Donaldson hit a bloop single to shallow right with two outs in the sixth.
Hendricks extended his franchise record of allowing two walks or fewer to 40 consecutive starts dating to April 7, 2019. Hendricks issued his lone walk to Eddie Rosario with two outs in the first after Bryan Buxton hit a single and advanced to third on a grounder and wild pitch.
But Hendricks induced Miguel Sano to ground out to short and never allowed a runner to advance past first the rest of the way.
Rizzo batted leadoff in place of Ian Happ, whom manager David Ross had planned in advance to rest after Thursday's day off to keep him fresh for the stretch drive.
In the most eye-opening move, left fielder Kyle Schwarber started despite entering the game mired in a 2-for-38 slump and hitless in six at-bats lifetime against Twins starter Rich Hill.
Schwarber's frustrating stretch took another dip when Hill shattered his bat and induced a weak grounder to third, where Kris Bryant wandered too far off the bag.
Josh Donaldson fielded the grounder and was able to tag Bryant before he could return to the bag to stunt a rally that concluded with Javier Baez striking out and Jason Heyward popping out to short.
With two outs in the third, Hill hit Schwarber with a pitch above the right elbow. But plate umpire Angel Hernandez ruled that Schwarber didn't get out of the way and called the pitch a ball.
Ross chatted briefly with Hernandez, who called Schwarber out on strikes on the next pitch.
Schwarber gained some redemption by hitting a single in his next at-bat in the sixth to snap an 0-for-13 slump, He was replaced by pinch-runner Billy Hamilton.
