2026 Chicago Cubs

2026 Chicago Cubs / Franchise: Chicago Cubs / BR Team Page

Record: , Finished in NL Central Division (2026 NL)

Managed by Craig Counsell

Coaches: Quintin Berry, Juan Cabreja, Ryan Flaherty, Tommy Hottovy, Casey Jacobson, Jose Javier, Dustin Kelly, John Mallee, Jonathan Mota and Mark Strittmatter

Ballpark: Wrigley Field

History, Comments, Contributions

The 2026 Chicago Cubs made two major additions over the off-season, signing free agent 3B Alex Bregman to a big contract and acquiring P Edward Cabrera in a trade with the Miami Marlins, a deal that cost them a couple of top prospects. Bergman's signing led to Matt Shaw, coming off a strong rookie season, moving to right field, but the team that took the field on Opening Day, March 26th against the Washington Nationals, was largely made up of holdovers from the team that had made it to the postseason in 2025.

The Cubs were rocked with a couple of major injuries to their starting pitchers in the early going, with Cade Horton, seen by many as a future ace after an excellent rookie season, going down for the season after just two starts, and 2025 All-Star Matthew Boyd joining him on the IL after just three starts, although in Boyd's case, the prognosis was for a return within a few weeks. That made the acquisition of Cabrera all the more important, and he pitched like a putative ace in his first five starts, going 2-0, 2.73. However, it was the Cubs' bats that carried the team in the early going as they put together a ten-game winning streak starting on April 14th. They scored ten or more runs in the first three of those wins, and at least five in eight of the ten games. Their best hitter was 2B Nico Hoerner, who was batting .299 with 4 homers and 23 RBIs after 26 games, but really every spot in the line-up was pitching in, including 22-year-old C/DH Moises Ballesteros was was at .400 at that same point. The streak improved Chicago's record to 17-9, tied with the Cincinnati Reds for best in the NL Central.

The winning streak ended with a 12-4 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers on April 25th. However, that loss was on the road, and the streak had included seven straight wins at Wrigley. The Cubs won the last two games of their road trip to finish April at 19-12, in second place in the NL Central, only half a game behind the Cincinnati Reds, and they continued winning when they returned home, first sweeping the Arizona Diamondbacks in a three-game series, and then recording a win over the Reds on May 4th thanks to a pinch-hit walk-off homer by Michael Conforto. That made it 12 straight wins at home and they were now two games ahead of their closest pursuers. Another walk-off win, this one courtesy of 10th-inning single by Michael Busch, pushed the streak to 13 wins on May 5th, and they made it three walk-off wins in a row the next day when they completed the sweep of the Reds with a 7-6 win, whose highlights included a two-run game-tying homer by Pete Crow-Armstrong in the 9th and a bases loaded walk to Busch that ended the game an inning later. It was the seventh time since 1900 the Cubs had won 14 straight at home with only an 18-game stretch in 1935 having been longer. It was not just the streak, though: the Cubs were now 18-3 in their last 21 games. They then eschewed the dramatics in completing a four-game sweep of the Reds by an 8-3 score on May 7th and at 15 games, the home winning streak was now officially the second longest since 1900 (there had also been a 21-game streak way back in 1880 when they were playing at a bandbox called Lakefront Park). A 6-0 loss to the Texas Rangers on May 9th ended what was their second winning streak of ten games that season, but it was on the road, so the Wrigley streak was still in play. Their home winning streak ended when they returned from a road trip on May 18th only to suffer a three-game sweep at the hands of the Milwaukee Brewers. That sweep was tacked on to losses against their South Side rivals, the Chicago White Sox in the final two games of a three-game series at Rate Field, and it reached ten games with a brutal 12-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates on May 26th. That skid had lowered them into a tie with the Bucs for last place in the division, 4 1/2 games back of the Brewers. They were only the second team in major league history to have both two ten-game winning streaks and one ten-game losing streak in the same season, after the 2017 Los Angeles Dodgers. If it was any comfort, that Dodgers team had ended up playing in the postseason.

Further Reading

• Jordan Bastian: "PCA defies the odds to help Cubs steal 3rd straight walk-off victory", mlb.com, May 7, 2026. [1]
• Will Leitch: "10 years after historic title, are Cubs ready to be back on top?", mlb.com, January 18, 2026. [2]
• Brent Maguire: "Breaking down the Cubs' extreme bullpen makeover", mlb.com, January 29, 2026. [3]

2026 MLB season by team