Two weeks into spring training, the Chicago Cubs finally lost a game on Sunday, March 2. The Cincinnati Reds beat them 7-3, ending a stretch of 11 straight wins or ties. The team’s spring winning percentage dropped, but only to .888.
Means nothing, right?
Is Cubs' hot spring a sign of things to come in 2025?
Only time will tell. But this much is a matter of record. Since 2009, 12 teams ran up spring winning percentages of .700 or better, and the average regular season winning percentage of those dozen teams was .531.
That would have been good for a postseason berth more often than not since the format was expanded in 2022. Four of those teams went on to win their division, and the 2018 Boston Red Sox — 22-9 that spring — took home the big prize in October.
Even by spring standards, what the Cubs have done to date is not unprecedented. In 2013, the Kansas City Royals opened their spring work with a 5-5 tie against the Texas Rangers on Feb. 22, then proceeded to reel off 11 consecutive victories before the Seattle Mariners slowed their roll 12-2 on March 7.
The Royals finished their spring work at 25-7, then went 86-76 during the regular season, finishing third in the AL Central. The downside: that was five and one-half games out of the final postseason spot. The upside: It marked a 14-game improvement from 2012.
One year later, the Royals were American League champs. Two years later they won it all. Of course, the Royals were 12-16 during the spring run-up to 2014. But they were 20-10 in their 2015 prep... again, make of it what you will.
To the extent club officials look seriously at any spring records, it is the individual performance data that gets their attention, not the win-loss totals. But there, too, some interesting trends are beginning to emerge under the second season of Craig Counsell’s watch at Sloan Park.
Consider that the Cubs entered play Sunday ranked No. 1 in numerous offensive categories a team would like to be No. 1 in. The table below shows where the Cubs ranked entering Cactus League play Sunday along with their closest pursuers or superiors.
Category | Cubs | MLB rank | Next |
|---|---|---|---|
Batting average | .307 | 1st | Mil. (.278) |
On-base percentage | .387 | 1st | KC (.375) |
Slugging | .504 | 2nd | Mil. (.514) |
HRs | 13 | 3rd | Mil. (18) |
Runs | 80 | 1st | Sea. (65) |
Walks | 50 | T-3 | KC (53) |
Steals | 17 | 2nd | KC (18) |
BABIP* | .376 | 1st | Col. (.359) |
Total bases | 195 | 1st | Mil. (161) |
*Batting average on balls in play.
As is always the case, the early spring numbers are somewhat influenced by guys who have no chance to be on the big league roster. Dixon Machado is five-for-10 (.500), not that anybody with the possible exception of his mom cares for 2025 purposes.
Then again, catcher Miguel Amaya is also hitting .500 — with an early .917 slugging percentage — and Cubs fans very much DO care about Amaya. Same story with center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong: a .500 average and .929 SLG. The narrative is also the same with first baseman Michael Busch: .500 and .889.
Give the Cubs good offensive seasons from that trio and stand back.
For Cubs fans, there’s always a down side even to the brightest of news developments, such as a hot spring start. In March of 2025, that down side is the performance of the pitching staff, which has a collective 4.12 ERA. For the nuclear-powered Cactus League, that’s decent, but six NL rivals to date have lower staff ERAs.
Some of the individual parts aren’t quite behaving like members of a winning staff. Shota Imanaga left his first spring outing with a 10.13 ERA, and Matthew Boyd is running a 6.23 ERA three starts in.
The easy early March reaction is to say it’s early, except it sort of isn’t. Imanaga will work the regular season opener against the Dodgers in Japan a little more than two weeks from now — that’s two or three starts in spring training time.
Of course, if Busch, Crow-Armstrong and Amaya continue to hit like they have been, pitching quality might be an ancillary concern for the Cubs this year.