CHICAGO \u2014 For much of 2025, the narrative surrounding the Chicago Cubs\u2019 season hasn\u2019t wavered.<\/p>\n
It was the offense that so often seemed to take center stage \u2014 whether that was because the hitters were hitting, or because they weren\u2019t.<\/p>\n
Watch Jed Hoyer\u2019s full end-of-season press conference only on the Marquee Sports Network app.<\/a><\/p>\n With the Cubs, it was a tale of two halves. The team was lethal in the season\u2019s initial months, exploding for 5.33 runs per game<\/a> as it rode red-hot streaks from Kyle Tucker<\/a> and Pete Crow-Armstrong.<\/a><\/p>\n But after the midsummer classic, that production dipped massively to the tune of 4.26 runs per contest.<\/p>\n The results displayed just that: A .594 winning percentage pre-All-Star break versus a .530 clip on the back stretch of the season can easily be chalked up to the offense going cold. The Cubs\u2019 lineup got fewer base hits, they slugged far less and they got on base less.<\/p>\n For Jed Hoyer, that\u2019s often just how baseball goes.<\/p>\n \u201cTo be honest with you, last year we sat here and we had a great second half offensively,\u201d the team\u2019s president of baseball operations said at his end-of-season press conference<\/a> last week. \u201cI think some of that stuff is random \u2014 when guys are hot and when they\u2019re not.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you look at the totality, we had a really excellent offensive team. We did have some struggles in the second half \u2014\u00a0 we had a collection of players in the first half at the same time who were playing exceptionally well, and then some of those same players struggled in the second half.\u201d<\/p>\n To Hoyer\u2019s point, several Cubs put together their best individual offensive seasons in 2025 despite how the second half shook out. Michael Busch<\/a> (34), Seiya Su<\/a>zuki (32) and Crow-Armstrong (31) each clubbed over 30 home runs, all of which were career-highs. Suzuki\u2019s 103 RBI tied him for the 11th-most in MLB, while Busch\u2019s .866 OPS was 12th-best. Nico Hoerner\u2019s<\/a> 178 hits were a career high and the sixth most in MLB.<\/p>\n Over 162 games, the Cubs\u2019 offensive numbers evened out: Their 4.90 runs per game was the fifth-best in MLB. It\u2019s their best number relative to the rest of the league since 2017<\/a>, when their 5.07 runs per game ranked them fourth. And in the end, the team as a whole was one of three NL clubs to be nominated for a Silver Slugger Award<\/a> for its offensive excellence.<\/p>\n Recency bias certainly affected how the Cubs\u2019 offense was viewed, especially after the NL Division Series Game 5 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers. Chicago struggled to capitalize on its best opportunities in the playoffs, going just 5-for-40 (.125) with runners in scoring position<\/a> \u2014 the second-worst clip in the postseason field and only just behind their NL Wild Card Series opponent, the San Diego Padres.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think that\u2019s indicative of anything, if I\u2019m being honest. It\u2019s eight baseball games against two of the best pitching staffs in baseball,\u201d Hoyer said of the Cubs\u2019 playoff offense. \u201cYou\u2019re not getting the matchups you\u2019re going to normally get during the season because of the nature of the postseason. So I think drawing big conclusions based on eight games against really good teams is probably not the best.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s also the question of how Wrigley Field plays as a hitter\u2019s ballpark. Historically, it\u2019s been a pitcher\u2019s paradise. Per Statcast\u2019s Park Factor<\/a> \u2014 a metric that measures how hitters perform at each MLB stadium relative to the rest of the league \u2014 Wrigley has been one of the five most difficult offensive ballparks over the past three seasons. The wind often blew in this season, perhaps causing difficulties to first-year Cubs like Tucker. Tucker saw his offensive numbers at home take a dip compared to on the road \u2014 a .723 OPS at Wrigley versus a .923 OPS in away games tells part of the story.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fact that a left-handed hitter struggled in a given year here isn\u2019t indicative that left-handed hitters can\u2019t perform here,\u201d Hoyer said. \u201cMichael Busch is a left-handed hitter and he hit a ton of homers. Pete (Crow-Armstrong) had a lot of homers at home. I think Cody (Bellinger) had great numbers at Wrigley in 2023 and he struggled in 2024.\u201d<\/p>\n Hoyer made it clear that, despite Tucker\u2019s 2025 splits, he doesn\u2019t subscribe to the idea of the park factor at Wrigley deterring free agent hitters from signing with the Cubs \u2014 whether that\u2019s Tucker or anyone else.<\/p>\n \u201cThe idea that Wrigley Field is a hitter\u2019s nightmare \u2014 the idea that free agents aren\u2019t going to come here is\u2026 I can\u2019t imagine a better place to play. That\u2019s something I reject outright.\u201d<\/p>\n Jed Hoyer on the park factor at Wrigley this season pic.twitter.com\/JeczeC1YXj<\/a><\/p>\n