The Pete Crow-Armstrong Super-Streak is Over, But Some of the Improvements Are Permanent

[Matthew Trueblood]

Image courtesy of © Jeff Hanisch-Imagn Images

In a strange way, the most telling plate appearance in the five-plus weeks since Pete Crow-Armstrong got molten-lava hot might have come Sunday afternoon, after the flow had raced down the mountain and begun to cool a bit. Brandon Woodruff struck out Crow-Armstrong in the first inning, but the next two times up, he was even more careful, and Crow-Armstrong drew two walks. In the third inning, Crow-Armstrong's swing decisions were dead solid perfect. In a six-pitch at-bat, Woddruff only hit the zone twice. Crow-Armstrong swung at both (changeups, fouled off) and took the four bad ones, including two very tempting offerings.

The sixth inning at-bat was even better. Woodruff went with the four-seamer that had worked to start the game, but couldn't hit the zone with it. He tried a changeup, but missed low. Crow-Armstrong got ahead 3-0, but with one out and nobody on base in a game the Brewers led 1-0, he stayed patient and took two strikes on the outer half. Then, Woodruff—never one to give up a free base without good cause—stayed in the zone three straight times, but only made one mistake, with the third 3-2 pitch. Hitting as defensively as one must in such a deep count, Crow-Armstrong fouled that off, too. When Woodruff missed away with the ninth pitch, though, he laid off and drew another walk.

Those were the 34th and 35th walks of the season for Crow-Armstrong, who only walked 53 total times in his first two-plus years in the majors. It's not just the walks that mark him as a different hitter. though. When he came to bat in the top of the eighth, he showed as much maturity as in either of his previous two trips. Facing the viciously difficult Abner Uribe, Crow-Armstrong did well to lay off a first-pitch sinker above the zone. It was called a strike, and he probably should have challenged it, but the Cubs have been conservative by design when it comes to batters challenging this season. At any rate, he made the right swing decision. Uribe lured him out of the zone on the next pitch, with a sinker that ran off the plate away, and Crow-Armstrong was down 0-2 in the most frustrating fashion.

For any hitter, that sequence—bad call strike, chase out of the zone—threatens to destabilize the mental approach. It's easy to get on tilt in such situations. For Crow-Armstrong, that sequence has nearly always led to an easy out for the pitcher. He's struggled mightily with that mental battle throughout his career. But this time, he laid off a sinker up and away, and then watched a slider that plunged out of the bottom of the zone. On 2-2, Uribe sawed him off with a slider, catching Crow-Armstrong a hair early because he needed to stay ready for the sinker. It was a floater that bounced lazily out to the middle infield, and despite getting jammed, Crow-Armstrong got out of the box well. He almost beat it out for an infield hit.

Yes, he was thrown out. No, he didn't play the hero, because the Brewers were careful not to let him do so. But that plate appearance was huge. It was tough, and professional, and it showed how Crow-Armstrong has improved both at staying in the fight and at covering multiple pitches within a pitcher's arsenal.

From May 22 through June 25, Crow-Armstrong batted .376/.456/.760. In 147 trips to the plate, he had 22 extra-base hits, including 12 homers. It was a transcendent heater, the likes of which the Cubs haven't seen since Derrek Lee's near-MVP season of 2005. (Technically, Aramis Ramírez also had a hotter 31-game stretch in 2006, but like Lee, Moisés Alou and Sammy Sosa, all of whom have been similarly good over such stretches during this century, Ramírez played in a much more offense-friendly league than does Crow-Armstrong.) With any streak that incredible, though, you can feel the moment when it ends, and that happened over the weekend. Crow-Armstrong drew four walks (one intentional, in the 10th inning Sunday) but was hitless against the Brewers. He's not quite clicking on everything that comes within his happy zone, the way he was a week ago.

What we saw Sunday, though, is that—not unlike that lava that hardens into rock after escaping the inferno—Crow-Armstrong has been reborn. He's not going to go back to the guy who batted .188/.237/.295 in August and September last year. His ceiling, as we now see, is as high as literally anyone in the sport; he is the only player in the last half-decade to demonstrate the ability to be as valuable as Shohei Ohtani. It's his floor that has really moved, though. He was, for a while there, capable of slumps as hideous as his streaks are thrilling. The new Crow-Armstrong simply can't be that bad. He's still going to have rough stretches, because he still borders on overly aggressive inside and outside the strike zone. He's morphed into a much more complete and dangerous hitter, though—even now that he's settling into a new normal, instead of doing backflips across a highwire, as he seemed to do for a month.

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[mk49]

Exactly.  Before the season, I told my brother that I wouldn't let my pitchers throw strikes against Pete, if I was the opponent's pitching coach.  That doesn't work anymore.  That's the best thing about Pete this year.  Nobody expected he would keep hitting like that for the rest of the season.  But, we know he won't be like the 2nd half of the last season.  

[Patrick88]

He could really jumpstart a rebuild...... now I will try to duck from Cubs fans arrows shot at me.