Craig Counsell romanticizes Pete Crow-Armstrong's monster night against Braves on cusp of MVP honors
It may have taken until game 153 of the season, but the aura and abilities of Pete Crow-Armstrong finally got to Chicago Cubs manager Craig Counsell.
The 24-year-old superstar has arguably been the most exciting player in Major League Baseball this season, having put together what feels like countless memorable performances, showing off his power at the plate, speed around the bases, and ability to cover a freakish amount of space roaming center field.
During the Cubs' 8-4 win over the Atlanta Braves on Wednesday night, PCA registered his seventh multi-home-run game of the season, with three of the seven taking place over the last three weeks alone.
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Something about Wednesday's two-home-run night, however, struck something within Counsell, so much so that he shared details about his emotions after his team's win over the Braves.
"When he hit the second homer, Alex Bregman was standing next to me," Cubs manager Craig Counsell said, according to MLB.com. "I said, ‘Alex, we don’t get to see things like this.’ You spend your whole life in baseball, and you just don’t see this happen on a baseball field. You’re grateful to be a part of it."
Crow-Armstrong's first home run of the contest came in the bottom of the third inning, and while it sent Wrigley Field into a frenzy, his second long ball of the night did, as Counsell alluded to, have a different feel about it.
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As PCA stepped to the plate in the bottom of the seventh inning, the hometown crowd decided to shower him with "MVP" chants. Facing an 0-1 count, he got the low, slightly below-the-zone pitch he's enjoyed hitting all season, and responded to the chants with a home run to right-center field.
"You’re grateful to see things like this," Counsell said. "And you’re grateful that the fans get to see a season like this, because they're going to talk about it. They're going to tell their kids about it. They're going to tell their grandkids about seasons like this."
As the Cubs' manager, Counsell is always going to praise his players after special performances, but for him to go down the semi-emotional path and explain that people will talk a bout Crow-Armstrong's season to their grandchildren is taking things to a level not often seen, especially when it comes to regular season baseball.
Crow-Armstrong's two homers give him 44 on the year, which officially moves him past Cubs legend and Hall of Famer Billy Williams for the most by a left-handed hitter in team history. PCA also connected for a triple during Chicago's win on Wednesday, giving him 81 extra-base hits on the year, another franchise single-season record.
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In a mind-blowing statistic shared by MLB's Sarah Langs, Crow-Armstrong's 10 total base game against the Braves marked the 10th time in his career he's accomplished the feat, which is three more such games than any other player before turning 25 years old, dating back to at least 1900.
If, for whatever reason, a member of the Baseball Writers Association of America was still on the fence about giving the nod for National League MVP to Crow-Armstrong this season, Wednesday night's show may have persuaded them.