{"id":112476,"date":"2025-06-18T07:18:07","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T07:18:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/112476\/"},"modified":"2025-06-18T07:18:07","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T07:18:07","slug":"cubs-takeaways-what-we-learned-as-pete-crow-armstrong-dazzles-in-win-vs-brewers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/112476\/","title":{"rendered":"Cubs Takeaways: What we learned as Pete Crow-Armstrong dazzles in win vs. Brewers"},"content":{"rendered":"

BOX SCORE<\/a><\/p>\n

CHICAGO \u2014 The Cubs opened a crucial three-game set against their second-place foes in the National League Central, the Milwaukee Brewers.<\/p>\n

Seiya Suzuki<\/a> was the headliner early.<\/p>\n

But make no mistake, this 5-3 win over the Brewers will be remembered for Pete Crow-Armstrong<\/a>. The center fielder was instrumental in the Cubs\u2019 (45-28) win.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s get to three takeaways from the game:<\/p>\n

PCA \u2013 MVP<\/p>\n

Crow-Armstrong dashed to the left center gap and seemingly plucked a Brice Turang liner with his glove inches before it touched the blades of grass in the outfield in the eighth inning.<\/p>\n

That ball seemed destined for extra bases with Crow-Armstrong diving for it. Instead, the Cubs center fielder snagged it, recording the second out and making a play seemingly only he can. Even his pitcher, left-hander Caleb Thielbar was visibly impressed.<\/p>\n

That elicited \u201cPCA\u201d chants from the 38,687 fans at Wrigley Field. It was a moment you can\u2019t top \u2014 well, unless you\u2019re Crow-Armstrong in 2025.<\/p>\n

As seemingly destined from the baseball gods, Crow-Armstrong led off the bottom half of the frame. On the first pitch he saw, he delivered a no-doubt, 452-foot blast off the right field scoreboard. It was a mammoth blast off left-hander Rob Zastryzny, his 19th home run of the year.<\/p>\n

The Wrigley Field faithful broke out another round of \u201cPCA\u201d chants after he touched home plate. When Brewers manager Pat Murphy trotted out to pull Zastryzny, chants of \u201cMVP\u201d broke out.<\/p>\n

This is a true breakout campaign from Crow-Armstrong. He doesn\u2019t lead National League outfielders in All-Star voting for nothing. He\u2019s having one of those special seasons \u2013 and Tuesday will be one of those nights that you remember fondly after the fact.<\/p>\n

Brown\u2019s outing<\/p>\n

Ben Brown\u2019s<\/a> first innings have been a talking point this season. That happens when you have a 10.50 ERA in the opening frame.<\/p>\n

But the right-hander looked solid in the first inning on Tuesday \u2013 he worked around a two-out double to post a zero in the frame. Smooth sailing, right?<\/p>\n

Well, Brown opened the second with a walk to Rhys Hoskins, then allowed a two-run home run to Isaac Colling and a single to Brice Turang. Things looked like they were teetering on the edge of a blowout inning in the second.<\/p>\n

Except Brown settled down and recorded three straight outs. It became a running theme for Brown \u2013 he had a baserunner in all five innings he pitched, but didn\u2019t allow any other runs beyond those two in the second. Not, too shabby.<\/p>\n

The Cubs don\u2019t need Brown to be the dominant righty who tossed six scoreless against the Los Angeles Dodgers in April or who threw seven no-hit innings against these Brewers last season. Sure, they\u2019ll take that kind of performance, but outings like Tuesday\u2019s are just as valuable.<\/p>\n

This team needs Brown to keep them in games. They can\u2019t be down a few runs in the first, have him leak more in an outing and then play catch-up. He kept them in the game Tuesday \u2013 and that allowed them to rally and win an important division contest.<\/p>\n

Seiya\u2019s smash<\/p>\n

Seiya Suzuki delivered the Cubs\u2019 big blow against Milwaukee on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

His three-run home run in the fifth inning gave the Cubs the lead for good. It\u2019s his fifth three-run home run this season. He entered the year with just two three-run blasts in his prior three seasons.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a testament as much to his offensive explosion this season as it is the overall depth of the Cubs\u2019 lineup compared to years past.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s enough quality up and down the Cubs\u2019 starting nine that they can work at-bats, allowing Suzuki to come up with runners on base. Of course, hitting around Kyle Tucker and an emerging Crow-Armstrong helps, too.<\/p>\n

The three-headed monster at the top of the Cubs\u2019 lineup of Tucker, Suzuki and Crow-Armstrong ain\u2019t too shabby.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BOX SCORE CHICAGO \u2014 The Cubs opened a crucial three-game set against their second-place foes in the National…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":112477,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2399],"tags":[5,734,138,24,4245,576,161,716,4,33,35,105,738],"class_list":{"0":"post-112476","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago-cubs","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-ben-brown","10":"tag-chicago","11":"tag-chicago-cubs","12":"tag-chicagocubs","13":"tag-craig-counsell","14":"tag-cubs","15":"tag-matt-shaw","16":"tag-mlb","17":"tag-nico-hoerner","18":"tag-pete-crow-armstrong","19":"tag-seiya-suzuki","20":"tag-wrigley-field"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114703152629693365","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112476\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}