Cubs aim to lock down their emerging star outfielder. Extension talks are set to resume this spring after a breakout season.
Chicago Cubs outfielder Pete Crow-Armstrong has become the face of Chicago sports this winter.
The All-Star center fielder has made his way around all the major sports in the Chicagoland area over the past few weeks. He went to two Bears games, a Blackhawks game, a Bulls game, and even visited the Northwestern baseball team.
Crow-Armstrong is fully embracing the love from Chicago at all these sporting events. And he deserves it after a breakout campaign in 2025.
The 23-year-old hit .247 with 31 home runs, 35 doubles, 95 RBI, and 35 stolen bases across 157 games. He became just the second player in Cubs’ history to have a 30-30 season and led the team with a 6 WAR last year.
Crow-Armstrong is also arguably the best defender in the game. He won the first Gold Glove of his career for his play in center field last year and ranked first in Runs Prevented and 5-star catches among all position players.
Although the young outfielder struggled offensively in the second half, it’s clear that Crow-Armstrong is an up-and-coming star in the league. He was recently ranked No. 40 on MLB Network’s Top 100 players entering the season.
With Crow-Armstrong blossoming into a star, the Cubs could get ahead of a potential extension for the 23-year-old.
They tried to negotiate a deal with Crow-Armstrong before last season, but the two sides couldn’t agree on an extension. Bruce Levine reported that the front office reportedly offered him a deal of around $90 million.
The Cubs could look to revisit those extension talks this offseason to lock down Crow-Armstrong for the foreseeable future. While he won’t be a free agent until after the 2030 season, extending him past that could be a smart move by the front office.
The good news is that it appears the Cubs will once again try to negotiate an extension with Crow-Armstrong this spring, which was confirmed by Jesse Rogers on a recent appearance of Waddle and Silvy last week.
“They’ll approach him in the spring,” Rogers said. “But that’s going to be another hard one because of what he is and what he could be and what his second half was compared to the first. I guarantee you if they started negotiating last July, the number was going to be huge. We don’t exactly [know] what he’s going to be.”
Rogers doesn’t exactly know if an extension will be agreed upon this spring because of the up-and-down season that Crow-Armstrong had in 2025. He had an MVP-caliber first half, but he really struggled in the second half.
With the center fielder still under team control for five more seasons, there might not be a rush for Crow-Armstrong to sign a long-term extension. He could wait until he puts together a complete season before agreeing to anything.
So, it’ll be interesting to see how those extension talks play out this spring. It is positive that the Cubs will be talking to him at some point to try to get something done.