Pete Crow-Armstrong has turned the top of the 1st inning into appointment viewing. The Cubs outfielder led off against Seattle with a home run off Mariners starter Emerson Hancock, and it wasn't a one-off — it's the 3rd time in his last 4 games that he's put the Cubs up before most fans have finished the national anthem.
PCA’s 3rd leadoff homer of week in 4 games?!?!?!
The homer itself was vintage PCA — a full-count fastball turned into a no-doubter, with the Cubs jumping ahead 1-0 before Seattle's lineup even saw a pitch. It was his 32nd of the season, according to Barstool Baseball, extending a power surge that's been building for weeks and dragging his name into the middle of the NL MVP conversation.
Crow-Armstrong rounds the bases after a leadoff blast against the Mariners, with the scoreboard showing Cubs 1, Mariners 0.
This isn't a hot week out of nowhere. Crow-Armstrong already made Cubs history earlier this month by becoming the franchise's first player since Sammy Sosa to string together back-to-back 30-30 seasons, and just the 10th player in MLB history to do it in consecutive years — a list that includes Willie Mays, Barry Bonds and Bobby Witt Jr. He clinched that milestone with a walk-off homer against the White Sox on August 17, a game he also opened with a leadoff shot, making him just the 6th player ever to bookend a game with a leadoff and walk-off homer.
Now the conversation has shifted from 30-30 to something almost nobody does: 40/40. With his power ticking past 30 homers and his legs already deep into the 30s in stolen bases, Crow-Armstrong is within shouting distance of joining a club that's only ever had a handful of members this century, most recently Shohei Ohtani's 50-50 campaign in 2024 and Ronald Acuña Jr.'s 40-40 season before that.
There's still real baseball left to play, and 40/40 is no gimme — but every leadoff homer chips away at the math and keeps the Cubs' offense ahead of schedule before the other team's bullpen has even loosened up. If Crow-Armstrong keeps treating the first pitch of the game like a personal invitation, this MVP case is going to write itself.