Pete Crow-Armstrong's Awesome Floor and Tantalizing Ceiling

After Pete Crow-Armstrong's hitless 19-plate appearance debut for the Chicago Cubs last season, it was evident to everyone that he had some work to do. Specifically, the top prospect looked overmatched against fastballs: he made contact just 47.4 percent of the time when he swung at four-seam fastballs in the strike zone, according to FanGraphs. I don’t think I need to add context to that figure. To put it simply, it's really bad. 

So bad was it, in fact, that it was absolutely no secret what Crow-Armstrong was working on this offseason.

“He’s been with DK, [hitting coach] Dustin Kelly, in Arizona, working on getting his swing a little bit more simple, being able to handle the high fastball a little bit more effectively and just changing some of his mechanics and approach from that standpoint,” general manager Carter Hawkins said at Cubs Convention in January.

Suffice to say, expectations were low for Crow-Armstrong when he was forced onto the big-league roster after an injury to Cody Bellinger in April. He wasn’t exactly lighting Triple-A Iowa on fire to that point. But to the surprise of many, the young center fielder more than held his own both in center field and at the plate for the Cubs. Looking at some of the under-the-hood numbers, it’s hard not to be excited about just how valuable a player he can develop into.

The easiest place to see if Crow-Armstrong is making adjustments is his performance against those high fastballs that Hawkins mentioned in his quote above. In 2023, 75 percent of his swings on four and two-seam fastballs in the top third of the strike zone, or above the strike zone, resulted in a miss, per Baseball Savant. In 2024, that number fell to 26.7 percent. 

In turn, that helped his overall performance against fastballs improve tremendously. After posting a .139 wOBA against all fastballs last year, he's put up a .287 wOBA against them in 2024. To be clear, that is still well below-average, but given Crow-Armstrong’s elite defense in center field, it’s important to remember that he doesn’t have to be Juan Soto at the plate to be a good player.

With just an 89 wRC+, the youngster is currently the Cubs’ sixth-most valuable position player, according to FanGraphs WAR--higher than Ian Happ, Christopher Morel and Seiya Suzuki. According to Baseball Reference WAR, he is their second-most valuable position player, with only Mike Tauchman being more productive. Keep in mind, this is in just 23 games and 63 plate appearances for Crow-Armstrong, significantly less time than any other regular. 

Of course, looking at WAR in such a small sample size can be a misleading practice. If we want to look at this from a big-picture point of view, this illustrates, to me, just how high Crow-Armstrong’s floor is. He doesn’t have to be a great hitter. He doesn’t even have to be above-average. His defense in center field is so good that he can still be one of the 50 or so best players in baseball with just a mediocre bat.

It might not seem an exciting outcome for such a highly-rated prospect, but I can’t stop thinking about Kevin Kiermaier when I watch Crow-Armstrong play. From Kiermaier’s rookie season in 2014 through 2017, he was the 36th-most valuable player in baseball, according to FanGraphs WAR. That was despite a 107 wRC+ and 1,734 plate appearances, both of which are lower than anyone ahead of him on that list. Extend the time frame from 2014 to the present day and Kiermaier is still 36th. That is how valuable really good defense at a premium position like center field can be, and I think if you told any Cubs fan they could lock production like that in from Crow-Armstrong for the next decade, they would probably take it.

What makes it all more exciting, however, is that that feels like a worst-case scenario. If Crow-Armstrong can keep making adjustments like he has and ends up being an above-average hitter, we might be looking at one of the best players in baseball. I find myself eagerly awaiting his return to the big-league team. It’s still a small sample, but we should all be thrilled with the adjustments and improvements that we’ve already seen from the Cubs’ top prospect.