After five months of an absolutely brutal offseason, the Cubs front office put an exclamation point on the down months when they signed Kyle Hendricks to a contract extension.

The news comes after several other MLB stars re-upped their contracts with their respective clubs in the last couple months. We have seen Mike Trout, Chris Sale, Paul Goldschmidt, Nolan Avocado, Jacob deGrom, Blake Snell, Aaron Hicks, Nate Lowe, Eloy Jimenez, and Max Kepler, Justin Verlander, Alex Bregman, Jorge Polanco, Luis Severino, Miles Mikolas, and Aaron Nola ink new deals and the Cubs finally joined in on the fun.

The deal for Hendricks comes out to a 5 year contract worth $63 million. His salary this season will stick to the $7.4 million agreed upon from his arbitration case before bumping up to $12 million in 2020 and then $14 million per year for the final 3 years of the contract. There will also be a vesting option for the 2024 season at $16 million with a $1.5 million buyout, but not as a team or player option. Instead the sixth year of the contract is dependent on his Cy Young finish for the 2020 season.

There may not be a player where a contract extension makes more sense for both the Cubs and the player more than re-signing Kyle Hendricks.

The soft-tossing, frisbee-throwing Hendricks has been one of the National League’s best arms since he broke onto the scene in 2014, putting up a career 3.07 ERA and 1.11 WHIP. His numbers hit a career best during the 2016 World Series run when he lead the league with a 2.13 ERA and finished third in the Cy Young voting. But he has been no slouch since then either, still putting up very low ERAs, very low walk rates, a career high in innings pitched last year, and increasingly more personality.

For The Professor, the deal makes a ton of sense. He has sat down this entire offseason watching a pitcher that might be his most comparable counterpart, Dallas Keuchel, fail to be signed by a Major League team. It appears as though teams don’t have enough faith in older pitchers without high velocity offerings as a part of their repertoire.

Which brings us to a good point. A good argument could be made that Hendricks is exactly the type of pitcher a team gives this type of extension to as a safe-bet option. While the margin for error on a guy like Hendricks is always small just because of the velocity at which he throws, he is a terrific example of a player that will age well throughout his 30s.

With so many hard throwers having to reinvent themselves into crafty veterans as their velocity wanes along with their playing years, The Professor has already been doing that his whole career. No need for reinventing himself. No need to come up with new found precision command. No need to add more bite on his pitches. It’s already there.

Hendricks mentioned during his press conference that he “loves everything about being a Chicago Cub” and I have to say, it’s been a mighty fine pleasure to watch him do his thing every fifth day on the bump. I hope you like going to school, because The Professor just got tenure and there will be plenty of classes to teach in his future.