MESA, Ariz. — After an All-Star season that nearly fell off the cliff in the second half last year, Chicago Cubs star Pete Crow-Armstrong is hoping for both improvement and more consistency as he enters 2026 with high expectations: He’ll man center field for a playoff contender this summer after doing the same for Team USA in the WBC this spring.
“I know what I do well. I know what I don’t do well,” Crow-Armstrong said this week from Cubs camp. “I know that I chase, I know that I can get away with hitting bad balls and doing damage on bad balls, but the consistency — there is no consistency there really. It’s very sporadic.”
Crow-Armstrong started the All-Star Game last July after hitting 25 first half home runs while stealing 27 bases. But everything took a dip in the second half when he got on base at just a 26 percent clip, hitting just six home runs. His set-up in the batter’s box was off and he chased too many bad pitches.
“What we saw last year was that the swing, it will work and it’ll play,” Crow-Armstrong said. “What we also noticed was that when the setup was out of whack and I wasn’t really getting in the box the same way and everything, that’s when the swing kind of went to crap and that’s when the mechanical stuff started playing a bigger role in the lack of success.”
Crow-Armstrong’s chase rate was 41.7 percent last year and though he did damage on a lot of bad pitches early in the season, he understands that kind of mentality and approach will catch up with a hitter. It eventually did, dropping his first half batting average from .265 to .216.
“I’m never practicing hitting those bad balls,” Crow-Armstrong said. “If I do it, I do it. And again, more often than not, if I’m swinging at some s– in my shins, it’s not usually back spun in the air. There will be times during the game when that does happen, but I saw that maybe twice, three times last year. I would love to just be on base more.
“The swing? We’ve kind of ironed that out. It’s not the most perfect thing in the world, but the steps we’ve taken with the swing over the last three years has been incredible and I’m very proud of that. What I’m not so proud is the .280 on base percentage and the 55% swing rate or whatever it was. That’s no fun. I had a lot more fun when I was playing well and when I was playing while I was keeping the ball in the middle of the plate and I was able to do damage there.”
PCA, as he’s known around the Cubs, will have plenty of help. Last year, veteran Justin Turner took him under his wing. Perhaps this season, it’ll be newcomer Alex Bregman. The relationship is already taking form in just a few days together in spring training.
“I think the sky is the limit for him,” Bregman said on Friday. “He can do anything on a baseball field. We’ve talked mostly about swing decisions and how dominant he is when he swings at good pitches to hit…The more that he refines his game, he’s going to continue to get better and better and better.”
Crow-Armstrong added: “We’ve just had a lot of cool conversations about approach and how we want to see me attack and get that OBP back up, that swing rate/chase rate down and I’m confident that he is somebody that will really help me with that.”
For is part, Cubs manager Craig Counsell isn’t looking at the back of PCA’s baseball card to assess his season. He knows his skill set can help the team in so many ways. Instead, he has that one simple goal for him. Improvement.
“When you get to that good place you never thing its going to go away,” Craig Counsell said with a smile. “That’s the devil of hitting. He’s a young hitter learning a lot…The goal for Pete is to keep improving. Let’s not stress out about the shape of the season. Let’s just keep improving. That’s my goal.”
Bregman and Crow-Armstrong will leave camp together at the end of the month to join Team USA as they prep for the WBC which takes place in early March. A young player leaving his team could set him back in terms of instruction from coaches but the value of being around so many great players on the world stage can’t be denied. Crow-Armstrong had difficulty containing his excitement for he tournament.
“We’re going to be really good,” Crow-Armstrong stated. “We got the two reigning Cy Youngs…I’m so fricking stoked. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do, I feel like everybody’s going to do the work for me. I just have to go play defense.”
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