The Cubs took down the Dodgers, 7-6, Wednesday night in a back-and-forth battle that was incredibly fun, just like the see-saw, extra-inning thriller on Tuesday that ended with an 11-10 Cubs victory. Pete Crow-Armstrong was a central figure in both wins and we’ll circle back to him quickly.
These two victories mean that the Cubs have taken the 2025 season series from the Dodgers despite dropping their first three games against them this year.
Overall, the Cubs are atop the NL Central at 16-10 (-175 to win the division, per BetMGM). It’s an even more impressive feat given they’ve played the hardest schedule in baseball by a huge margin (opponent winning percentage is .624 while the Diamondbacks are second at .539).
This has been a team effort and Kyle Tucker is clearly the centerpiece superstar of the Cubs this season. Crow-Armstrong, though, is becoming a complete player right before our eyes and looks every bit like a star in the making.
The Dodgers have certainly seen enough of him. On April 13, Crow-Armstrong went 3 for 4 with a triple and two home runs in a 4-2 Cubs win. On Tuesday, he went 3 for 5 with a double and home run. A day later, he went 3 for 4 with a home run, four RBI and two stolen bases.
The book on the 23-year-old Crow-Armstrong (henceforth “PCA” for the purposes of brevity and because that’s what Cubs fans were chanting Wednesday night after the win) coming up through the minors was that he’s capable of being an exceptional defensive center fielder who can run the bases like the best in baseball, too. The question was whether or not he’d ever hit well enough to reach star status.
Drafted 19th overall by the Mets in 2020 out of high school, the Cubs acquired PCA at the 2021 trade deadline in exchange for a few months of Javier Báez. Many panned the Mets for the short-sighted deal and, sure enough, it looks like a big mistake right now.
The defense and baserunning haven’t ever disappointed. PCA is 10 of 11 in steals this season and now 39 of 45 in his brief major-league career. More than just the steals, any time he gets on first base he disrupts the entire game. The eye test says he’s an utter terror on the basepaths. Sure enough, the baserunning component of Fangraphs’ WAR has PCA in first with players like Byron Buxton, Victor Scott II, Elly De La Cruz, Corbin Carroll and Brice Turang sitting in the top 10.
Defensively, again, the eye test says that PCA has range for days (miles?!). Any time there’s a fly ball in the vicinity of center field in a Cubs game, you can easily see him darting across the screen and getting to most of them before they hit the ground. His 67 putouts in center lead the National League and it’s a good indication of his range. He hasn’t committed an error. Sure enough, WAR backs up the eye test again. PCA is the top outfielder in FanGraphs’ WAR and second among all defenders behind D-backs shortstop Geraldo Perdomo.
Baseball Savant readings have PCA in the 99th percentile among all big leaguers in baserunning value and at the 100th percentile in fielding value.
And to reiterate, anyone watching him regularly doesn’t need numbers. It’s easily evident in just watching a few games that he’s one of the greatest and most exciting players on defense and the basepaths.
That bat took some time, though, and there will be growing pains again in all likelihood.
In 2023, he was 0 for 14 with seven strikeouts. Through 66 games last season (July 26), PCA was hitting .180/.230/.292 with 51 strikeouts in 178 at-bats. Much of the time, he simply looked overmatched. You’d see flashes of ability, sure, but overall he was a 22-year-old kid whose bat just wasn’t MLB-ready. He finished the season strong, though it wasn’t the largest sample and there still had to be concerns moving toward 2025. In his first six games this season, PCA hit .091/.167/.136.
He seems to have flipped the proverbial switch since, though.
In his last 20 games, PCA is hitting .350/.388/.663 with eight doubles, a triple, five homers, 16 RBI, 18 runs and nine stolen bases. All this in just 87 plate appearances. It’s a small sample, sure, but it’s been against tough competition and we could go back to July 27 last season to find where it seems that things started to click.
That’s a sample of 57 games in 2024 and the full 26 games this year. It still isn’t a full season, obviously, but 83 games is a decent sample. In this stretch, PCA is hitting .291/.328/.497 with 17 doubles, four triples, 12 home runs, 47 RBI and 56 runs in just over a half season. That isn’t bad for a guy that some worried was all defense and baserunning.
In that time frame, PCA is sixth in baseball in WAR, trailing only Aaron Judge, Carroll, Bobby Witt Jr., Shohei Ohtani and Francisco Lindor. Yeah, it’s an arbitrary endpoint and not even close to a full-season sample, but that’s a testament to the ability PCA has if he’s swinging the bat even remotely well.
It bears repeating one more time that PCA will continue to show inconsistency with the bat. He’s not just all of a sudden one of the best hitters in baseball. He’ll hit a slump again. But this recent stretch shows what a game-changer he is when he is hitting.
Right now, he’s crushing the ball and the Cubs are cruising. He is now one of the most exciting players in baseball to watch and the upside sure looks like one of the best all-around players in baseball. It’s something to watch here in the early portion of the season as the Cubs establish themselves as a legitimate contender in the 2025 season.
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