Howie Kendrick greeted reliever Will Harris by sending his second pitch off the rightfield foul pole to give the Nationals a lead they’d never relinquish and thus becoming a Game 7 World Series Hero for the Washington Nationals
Just try to remember October 30, 2019, the Washington Nationals are playing in Game 7 of the World Series against the Houston Astros. The Nationals are still trailing the Astros 2-1 after Anthony Rendon hits a solo Homerun, and Juan Soto was walked. Howie Kendrick steps up to the plate against Astros pitcher Will Harris.
Kendrick then takes a 0-1 cutter low and away and lines it to strike the screen on the right-field foul pole, which became the go-ahead runs the Nationals would need to win their first World Series Championship in Franchise history.
But before we take a look at the 2019 Howie Kendrick and his postseason heroics, for the Washington Nationals, the road to 2019 was long.
"He's a key component to our leadership structure here, a mentor to our young players,
Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo about Howie Kendrick after the 2019 World Series via USA Today
After the Washington Nationals won the World Series, Nationals closer Daniel Hudson discussed Howie Kendrick's homerun by saying: "I've said it the entire time I've been here – if we've got guys on base, in scoring position, two outs, I want Howie Kendrick at-bat."
In 2002, the Los Angels Angels selected Kendrick in the tenth round of the baseball draft and made his Major League Baseball debut in 2006 and played for the Angles from 2006 to 2014. Kendrick's first Major League hit was a line-drive single to center off Pitcher Barry Zitto of the Oakland Athletics and hit his first home run against Shawn Camp of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays on July 26, 2006. In the remaining 2006 season, Kendrick finished with a .285 with four homers and 30 RBIs.
During his time in LA, Kendrick had a batting average of .292, a slugging percentage of .424 with 501 RBI's, 78 Home runs, 1,204 hits in the 1,081 games Kendrick played over the nine seasons.
In 2011, while with the Angles, Kendrick was selected to serve as an American League reserve in the 2011 All-Star Game at Chase Field in Phoenix, Arizona.
During the 2014 offseason, Kendrick was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers and then suffered a strained hamstring on August 9, 2014, and didn't return to playing until September 18, 2014. Due to his injury, Kendrick only played in 117 games, hit .295 with nine home runs, and had 54 RBI's.
After playing for the Dodgers for two seasons, Kendrick was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies again during the 2016 offseason. Kendrick only played for the Phillies for one season. Howie Kendrick ended up playing only 39 games and had only 156 plate appearances during the 2017 season. Kendrick finished the 2017 season with a batting average of .340, a slugging percentage of .454, and only had two home runs and 16 RBI's.
When we think of the Nationals and 2019, the first player to our mind is Howie Kendrick. When the 2019 season started back in March, one couldn't predict that one of the many postseason heroes would be Howie Kendrick, the same player who had ruptured his Achilles on May 19, 2018, ending his season early.
In 2018, Kendrick finished the season batting .303 with four home runs and had 12 RBI's. The previous season in 2017, after he was traded from the Phillies to the Nationals, Kendrick finished the season batting .293, with seven home runs and 25 RBI's.
At the beginning of Spring Training in 2019, no one anticipated Kendrick filling the $330 million man's production and 2015 MVP (Bryce Harper), but it turns out that Kendrick did do that.
"He's a key component to our leadership structure here, a mentor to our young players," says Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo, who thought so highly of Kendrick he signed him to a two-year deal after acquiring him from Philadelphia in 2017.
Kendrick played in 121 regular-season games in 2019, finishing with a batting average of .344 in 330 at-bats, alongside 62 RBIs and 17 home runs, second-most of any season in his career and a total of 115 hits all season long.
During the 2019 season, Kendrick played a significant time at first base while in the infield. During the season, he played 48 games at first, 23 at second. Kendrick also appeared as a pinch hitter 41 times during the season. While playing at first base, Kendrick performed great by only committing one error and had a fielding percentage of .997%.
At the plate and in the infield, Kendrick was a great bat that the Nationals could use in situational baseball and was a perfect part of the first base platoon between Ryan Zimmerman and Matt Adams.
During the 2019 season, around the All-Star Game, Adam Eaton and Howie Kendrick's love for cars translated to the dugout after one of them hit a home run. They decided to pretend to grab a stick sift, shove in the clutch, and they're off to the races. This "dance" became very popular during the rest of the season and continued to the World Series.
Adam Eaton discussed his enjoyment of the dance during an interview. He stated: "Now, we love it …. I look forward to it. I round the bases like, 'Man, I get to drive." The "clutch" became so popular that a little league team in Alexandria, VA, even broke out the move at a recent game.
View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Adam Eaton (@adam_eaton2)
Kendrick became an essential player for the Nationals during the 2019 Post Season. His presence was felt in Game 5 of the National League Division Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. In the top of the 10th inning of that game, Kendrick hit a grand slam off Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Joe Kelly to give the Nationals a 7-3 lead held up as the final score, advancing the Nationals to the National League Championship Series. It was just the second extra-innings grand slam in MLB postseason history, the other being hit by Nelson Cruz in the 2011 American League Championship Series.
In the National League Championship Series, Kendrick went 5 for 15 with four doubles and 4 RBIs in the Nationals' four-game sweep of the St. Louis Cardinals, earning him the National League Championship Series MVP award.
In the World Series against the Houston Astros, Kendrick had a batting average of .280, an OPS of .708, a slugging percentage of .400. Howie Kendrick had 3 RBIs, one home run, seven hits, 26 plate appearances, and appeared in all seven series games.
Even though the Washington Nationals declined their 2021 club option on Kendrick, making the former World Series hero a free agent, one can not rule out Kendrick's return to the Washington Nationals.
We hope that Howie Kendrick will return to the Washington Nationals, as as he has become part of the team fabric. If Major League Baseball decides to make the DL option permanent, his return to the Nationals is even more likely to happen.
Tell us what you think in the comment secti