Cubs' Pete Crow-Armstrong's swag has Caleb Williams noticing
The post Cubs' Pete Crow-Armstrong's swag has Caleb Williams noticing appeared first on ClutchPoints.
Chicago Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong has a flare that is hard to ignore, and Bears quarterback Caleb Williams couldn't help but notice.
Advertisement
Armstrong cranked a solo home run that helped the Cubs cement a 5-3 victory over the Milwaukee Brewers on Monday. Crow-Armstrong watched the ball fly after tossing his bat aside with real bravado, and Chicago's social media team posted a photo of the moment that Williams re-posted to his Instagram account. The picture in question featured a fitting caption.
'SAY IT WITH US, MVPETE,' the caption said.
The home run came shortly after Crow-Armstrong made a grab that had a five percent catch probability according to Statcast.
'Every game he plays is like two games for a normal person,' said Cubs starter Ben Brown, 'just with how hard he plays.'
Advertisement
Crow-Armstrong is in the midst of a true breakout season. Through 72 games, the 23-year-old has bashed 19 home runs, recorded 58 RBIs, and earned an .856 OPS. In the field, he ranks in the 100th percentile in Fielding Run Value and the 84th percentile in Arm Value.
The California native's exceptional start is part of why Chicago is presently leading their division by 6.5 games. The Cubs boasts some of the game's most dangerous hitters. Kyle Tucker, Dansby Swanson, Seiya Suzuki, and Crow-Armstrong have formed a unit that could potentially be destined for October.
'The group cares about each other,' said Cubs outfielder Ian Happ. 'They care about beating out the double-play ball to get the next guy up in an RBI situation. You care about those little things, and that's what kind of keeps the game rolling through 162.'
The Cubs have not made the postseason since the COVID-shortened 2020 season. Crow-Armstrong's signature swagger will have to keep working its magic if Chicago has designs on making a legitimate run at the National League crown.
Related: Cubs trade proposal lands Zac Gallen from Diamondbacks
Related: Cubs' Pete Crow-Armstrong drops 5-word declaration on Home Run Derby interest
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Times
6 minutes ago
- New York Times
Thunder win first NBA title since relocating to OKC, hold off Pacers in Game 7
OKLAHOMA CITY – The Oklahoma City Thunder are now authors of one of the greatest seasons in NBA history after narrowly avoiding a stunning upset with the opponent's best player first hobbled then seriously injured. The Thunder won the franchise's second championship – and first since it moved to Oklahoma City from Seattle in 2008 and rebranded from the SuperSonics to the Thunder – by capturing Game 7 of the NBA Finals over the Indiana Pacers, 103-91, on Sunday. Advertisement Oklahoma City won 68 regular-season games (tied for the fifth-most in NBA history), set a league record for average margin of victory (12.9 points per game), and had the league MVP on its side before reaching its crowning achievement. Speaking of the player deemed most valuable during the regular season, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the 26-year-old Canadian and league scoring champ, scored 29 points and added 12 assists in the series-clinching win. Jalen Williams added 20 points and two steals and Chet Holmgren contributed 18 points, eight boards and five blocks. The Thunder, who boasted the league's No. 1 defense during the regular and postseasons, suffocated the Pacers by forcing 23 turnovers for 31 points. But there's an asterisk – at least as far as the Pacers are concerned. Indiana was led by Bennedict Mathurin's 22 points off the bench and T.J. McConnell added 16 points – necessitated by a potentially devastating Achilles injury suffered by Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton in the first quarter. Pascal Siakam contributed 16 points but shot 5-of-13, and Andrew Nembhard scored 15 points. Haliburton, who had been playing with a strained right calf since Game 5, fell without contact as he was attempting to dribble past Gilgeous-Alexander and immediately pounded the court in agony without getting up. A replay showed his already injured calf ripple as he fell, and Haliburton's father, John, told the ESPN broadcast that the injury was to his son's Achilles. A non-contact injury, after a strained calf, immediately sparks fears of a torn Achilles, a la Kevin Durant in the 2019 finals. The Thunder led 18-16 at the time of Haliburton's departure. Haliburton was off to a great start, connecting on three 3-pointers. Somehow, momentum didn't swing after the injury. Nembhard's 3-pointer at the second-quarter buzzer sent the Pacers into halftime with a 48-47 advantage. Advertisement The Thunder finally started to pull away in the third. Isaiah Hartestein's layup with 29 seconds to go in the period put the Thunder up by 13, and then Gilgeous-Alexander canned a 3 at the start of the fourth for an 84-68 advantage. Because these are the Pacers, and no lead is safe with them, of course Oklahoma City's 22-point lead in the fourth quarter was cut to 10 with 2:16 left. Williams' two foul shots with 1:26 to go made it 100-87, Thunder, and removed any serious doubt. Indiana was one win shy of becoming one of the biggest underdogs ever to win a championship and gave us a series that most prognosticators, and many fans, simply didn't expect. The odds were swayed so heavily against the Pacers that Vegas bookmakers had them as the least favored team to win a finals before it started since 2004. The Pacers were kings of the comeback, with NBA records for 15-point comebacks in the postseason (five) and wins after trailing by seven or more points with a minute remaining (three). They pulled one of those stunners by erasing a double-digit deficit to beat the Thunder on Tyrese Haliburton's last-second shot in Game 1, and with the series even for Game 3, Mathurin stunned the Thunder with 27 points off the bench for another upset. It looked like the Pacers might be 60 minutes away from their first NBA championship when they had a 10-point lead late in the third quarter of Game 4, getting close to building a 3-1 series lead – which only one team in finals history had ever overcome. But Gilgeous-Alexander scored 15 points over the final 4:38 to lead Oklahoma City to a Pacers-style comeback that altered the series. Indiana nearly pulled off another rally in Game 5, cutting an 18-point deficit down to two in the fourth quarter, before four consecutive steals by the Thunder, coupled with Williams' 40 points, swayed that game in their favor. The Pacers reciprocated in Game 6, blowing out Oklahoma City to force a Game 7. They led by 30 points after three quarters. Advertisement The Pacers' challenge was fierce, and the magnitude of the stage made it feel more intense, but Oklahoma City battled through adversity at prior stops during the playoffs. The Denver Nuggets took the Thunder to seven games in the Western semifinals, and though Oklahoma City beat Minnesota in five games in the conference finals, the Timberwolves smashed the Thunder by a whopping 42 points in Game 3 of that series. Whether they dominated, survived or a combination of both, the Thunder's championship could be the most important for the league since the start of the Golden State Warriors' dynasty in 2015 because of where Oklahoma City is as a franchise in this current NBA era where dynasties are otherwise a thing of the past. The Thunder are the second-youngest team in at least the last 70 years to win a finals, with an average age per player of 25.56, when weighted for playoff games played, according to the league. Only the 1976-77 champion Portland Trail Blazers were younger, by an average age of about half a year per player. Oklahoma City went 29-1 against the East in the regular season and won the West by a dizzying 16 games. They have every rotation player under contract for next year, a lottery pick from 2024 (Nikola Topić) who didn't even play this season because of injury, and a staggering collection of draft assets – including 13 first-round picks over the next seven summers, which could be used to build the team's depth or packaged in trades to keep the team stocked with veterans and potential stars. They are the seventh different team to win the finals in as many seasons, and this is the longest drought of repeat champions in NBA history, but they were constructed unlike any of the previous six champions. It was the starting center from Oklahoma City's worthy finals opponent, Myles Turner, who perhaps most eloquently described the potential sea change of how the best NBA teams are built. 'I think it's a new blueprint for the league,' Turner said after the Pacers beat the New York Knicks to set a matchup with the Thunder in the finals. 'I think the years of the superteams and stacking, it's just not as effective as it once was, you know what I mean? Advertisement 'Since I've been in the league, the NBA has been very trendy; it just shifts. But the new trend now is just kind of what we're doing. OKC does the same thing — young guys get out and run, defend and use the power of friendship.' Basically, Sam Presti has done it both ways. The Thunder's executive vice president and general manager pieced together the first Thunder finals team – the one centered around three NBA superstars in Kevin Durant, James Harden and Russell Westbrook that reached the finals in 2012 and remained a West contender, even after trading Harden, until the team broke apart years later when Durant left in free agency in 2016. When Presti decided to start over by trading Paul George to the LA Clippers in the summer of 2019, the centerpiece of the enormous package Oklahoma City received in return was Gilgeous-Alexander, a slender, cerebral, burgeoning talent who had just come off his rookie campaign. The Thunder were excited about Gilgeous-Alexander, but they could not have known they were getting a future scoring king and MVP. Also unusual: Signing an undrafted free agent to split time between the G League and the end of the bench in the NBA, who becomes perhaps the sport's best perimeter defender. That's what happened the same summer that Oklahoma City traded for Gilgeous-Alexander when they signed Luguentz Dort, a walking muscle who developed into a lockdown defender and 3-point threat. The Thunder won 22 and 24 games in their first two seasons with Gilgeous-Alexander and Dort, and then in June 2022, drafted both Holmgren and Williams in the lottery. Holmgren missed his rookie year because of injury, but the team won 40 games in Williams' first season. There was a lift off. Last year, with Holmgren on the court for 82 games, Oklahoma City became the youngest team to ever finish first in the conference. After a disappointing — but perhaps necessary for learning purposes — loss in the second round in 2024 to the Dallas Mavericks, the Thunder returned this season stronger by adding Caruso and Isaiah Hartenstein. Presti's full, down-to-the-studs rebuild took six years. Advertisement 'I think we had clarity,' said Thunder coach Mark Daigneault, whose first season on the bench was that 22-win season of 2020-21. 'This was never the plan specifically. There was never a specific timeline. You plan as many seasons as you can and you tend to them, then you see what happens. We've gotten some good luck in this period of time, too, that we're not denying at all. We've also tried to control what we can. The guys have done an incredible job. It's landed us in a great spot. 'But as grateful as we are for that, we understand we have to keep investing if we want to keep reaping the long-term benefits of that.' Young, run, defend, friendships. Oklahoma City's defense was tops overall, with a net rating of 106.6 (which is the number of points they allowed per 100 possessions – which may seem high, but keep in mind how much the game itself has changed over the years, with more 3s and possessions). They held opponents under 100 points in an NBA-best 19 games, led the NBA in steals, deflections, opponent turnovers and points off turnovers. Dort and Williams made All-NBA Defensive teams. Young, run, defend, friendships. The Pacers' reputation is based on playing fast, at relentless, breakneck speed that includes pressing on defense the length of the court. But did you know the Thunder played faster than the Pacers all season – including the playoffs? That pace, of course, was spearheaded by Gilgeous-Alexander, who led the NBA in scoring from his point guard position, at 32.7 points per game. Born in Toronto, raised in Hamilton, Ontario and a product of the University of Kentucky, Gilgeous-Alexander led the NBA with four games of 50 or more points and scored at least 20 in each of his last 72 regular-season games – the first player to have that long of a 20-point streak since 1964. He knocked off defending MVP Nikola Jokić to claim the league's top individual honor. Advertisement Joining Gilgeous-Alexander as both an All-Star and All-NBA selection was Williams, who (along with SGA) is among only five players averaging at least 20 points, five rebounds, five assists and 1.5 steals. 'He is one of the biggest reasons why we're here,' Gilgeous-Alexander said of Williams. 'I think both of us just trust each other, have the same mindset, winning mindset, want the best for each other above all. Me and him are also naturally really good friends. We talk all the time on and off the court. Always together. That helps with it, for sure.' Young, run, defend, friendships. Williams and Holmgren, who was hurt for most of the regular season but put up big numbers in the 32 games for which he was available, are both extension-eligible this summer. Their contracts are likely to get more expensive, and under the NBA's current collective bargaining agreement, it is harder to enjoy sustained excellence as salaries increase because of the punitive rules for going over the salary cap. But the Thunder have the room to pay Williams and Holmgren massive raises, and the draft capital to retool if tough decisions are needed on a veteran player's salary. In the meantime, they seemingly have one superstar in Gilgeous-Alexander, two All-Stars or potential All-Stars in Williams and Holmgren and a team that genuinely likes one another. After each win on national TV this season and last, when Gilgeous-Alexander would inevitably be stopped for a live interview, numerous teammates would often squeeze into the shot and stand with him during the interview. They sometimes barked like dogs. 'I feel like both teams, you look at Indiana, like a closer look at them, they're like us,' Williams said. 'You can see the team chemistry that they have. You can see they love playing with each other. They enjoy being in these moments together. 'They're starting to look like what the blueprint of the NBA is. When you get a group of guys that like playing with each other, like doing stuff for each other, just are constantly willing to make the extra sacrifices, extra plays for each other, as we go through these ups and downs in the season, I think that's what makes you a good team.' To Williams' point, and Turner's before it, Indiana and Oklahoma City are similar. In the middle of a 25-win season in 2021-22, the Pacers traded franchise centerpiece Domantas Sabonis for Haliburton and Buddy Hield. The organization chose to build around Haliburton, whom it correctly predicted was destined to become a star, adding fast, gritty, talented shooters who could defend to supplement Haliburton's speed and court vision. Last season, the Pacers traded for Siakam, the perfect co-star for Haliburton, who runs the court, plays with the ball in his hands and moves without it and defends. Advertisement After three consecutive years of missing the playoffs, Indiana not only returned to the postseason but reached the Eastern finals before falling to eventual champion Boston last year. This season started slowly, with 10 victories against 15 defeats while Haliburton was plagued with easily the longest, most severe slump of his career. Nemhard and Nesmith were out with injuries; Indiana often relied on G Leaguers to fill out its rotation during the season's early months. Fortunes turned with the calendar. From Jan. 1 through the end of the regular season, the Pacers went 46-18 to claim the No. 4 seed in the East. Indiana steamrolled its way through the Eastern playoffs to reach its second finals. The Pacers stunned the No. 1 seed Cavaliers by beating them in Cleveland twice to open the conference semifinals, and then did the same thing to the No. 3 Knicks in the conference finals. Those first two wins at Madison Square Garden set them up to close out that series at home in Game 6, after which Rick Carlisle said to a delirious Indianapolis crowd at Gainbridge Fieldhouse: 'In 49 other states, it's just basketball. But this is Indiana.' But Indiana's short-term prospects are now frustratingly in question, tied to the severity of Haliburton's injury. The Thunder's present, and future, is shining brightly. This story will be updated. (Photo of Jalen Williams:)
Associated Press
7 minutes ago
- Associated Press
Kayla Thornton scores 21 as Valkyries hand Sun 6th consecutive loss, 87-63
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Kayla Thornton had 21 points and eight rebounds, Tiffany Hayes scored 14 points on Sunday night and the Golden State Valkyries beat the Connecticut Sun 87-63. Connecticut (2-12) has lost six straight. Laeticia Amihere had 10 points and a career-high 12 rebounds — her first career double-double — for Golden State (7-6). The Valkyries, who beat Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever 88-77 on Thursday, have won five of six. The Sun's 63 points were the fewest Golden State has allowed in a game this season. Chloe Bibby scored 11 points, Veronica Burton added 10 and Stephanie Talbot grabbed a season-high 10 rebounds to go with six points and four assists. Golden State set a franchise record for points in a quarter with 36 — including 14 by Thornton — in the second. The Valkyries made 10 of 18 from the field and 12 of 14 from the free-throw line, where Thornton was 7 of 7, and turned four offensive rebounds into seven second-chance points. Connecticut scored 12 points of 4-of-16 shooting in the quarter and trailed 59-32 at halftime. Bibby hit a tiebreaking 3-pointer to close the first quarter and another 3 to open the second before Thornton converted a three-point play to cap a 12-2 run that gave the Valkyries a 32-22 lead with 8:20 left in the first half. Aneesah Morrow led the Sun with 14 points and Jacy Sheldon scored 10. Connecticut shot 30% (20 of 66) from the field, 7 of 24 (29%) from 3-point range. Up next The Valkyries play the third of four consecutive home games against defending WNBA champion New York and the Sun play at Las Vegas on Wednesday. ___ AP WNBA:
CBS News
7 minutes ago
- CBS News
Oklahoma City Thunder prevail in Game 7 of NBA Finals to secure first title since relocating from Seattle
The Oklahoma City Thunder beat the Indiana Pacers 103-91 in Game 7 of the 2025 NBA Finals to secure its first championship since 1979, back when the team was the Seattle SuperSonics. League MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander led the way for the Thunder with 29 points. Pacers star guard Tyrese Haliburton, who had been playing with a strained calf, went down in the second quarter of the game with what the team called a right lower leg injury. Haliburton collapsed to the floor and immediately started pounding his fist on the court in pain. His father, John Haliburton, told ABC it was an Achilles tendon injury. This story will be updated.
