Top Chicago Cubs pitching prospect Jaxon Wiggins was rumored to be in the city this past weekend, but while fans shouldn’t get too excited just yet, the right-handed pitcher is finally taking serious steps forward in his recovery from elbow inflammation that knocked him out of game action for nearly two months.

Wiggins was down in Arizona, ramping back up after last pitching for the Iowa Cubs at Triple-A back on April 4. He made one appearance in the Arizona Complex League before being assigned to a rehab stint with the South Bend Cubs at High-A Ball.

It’s been an uphill battle for Wiggins to stay on the mound since he was drafted in the second round out of Arkansas in 2023. He’s been the No. 1 pitching prospect in the Cubs’ organization since Cade Horton officially graduated from that status in the summer of 2025, but Wiggins has been treated with kid gloves ever since.

In 2025, Wiggins posted a 2.19 ERA in the minor leagues, but he pitched only 19 games and threw 78 innings. As dire a situation as the Cubs’ pitching staff has found itself in this season, fans should probably hold back their expectation of when to see Wiggins make his MLB debut.

Yes, after two successful starts for Wiggins with South Bend, returning to Triple-A, and eventually becoming an option to contribute to the big-league club in 2026 is back on the table, but as Bruce Levine stated, that most likely won’t be until much later in the regular season.

Yet, this past week was positive for Wiggins. He threw 2.2 innings on June 21 and then looked sharp on June 27, striking out four with no walks and only two hits allowed in 3.2 innings.

It was pretty concerning that there really wasn’t much of an update on Wiggins until June, but he’s back on the mound, should be ready to resume his normal routine in Triple-A, and that’s a big win after his setback at the start of the regular season.

As long as there are no other setbacks, Wiggins will still have to prove that he can throw enough strikes to become a viable MLB pitcher this year. If he does, the Cubs could certainly use him in some capacity, even if it means it’s in short bursts out of the bullpen.

(Previous Update)

Jaxon Wiggins last pitched on April 4 and then was scratched from his next start at Triple-A. The organization was supposedly taking it slow with Wiggins, who was also slowly guided through the 2025 season. However, ever since Jed Hoyer initially gave an update on the Cubs’ top pitching prospect you knew something was wrong.

We’re less than a week away from June, and Wiggins remains in Arizona, seemingly making little progress in the Cubs’ spring training facility. The 24-year-old pitcher was suffering from elbow inflammation in April, when he was first shut down this season. Now, seven weeks later, Wiggins is throwing off the mound, but he doesn’t appear to be close to game action.

Hoyer had a rather vague update on Wiggins earlier this week, which doesn’t exude much confidence that Wiggins will be a factor any time soon.

Not ideal. Maybe it was premature to expect Wiggins to come up and help the 2026 Cubs, but it also wasn’t too far-fetched to think the right-handed pitcher could have been an option down the stretch. Now you just hope he stays healthy.

The Chicago Cubs put a beatdown on the San Diego Padres, sweeping them at Wrigley Field as the offense was fueled by a franchise-record eight home runs en route to a 23-3 thrashing. Dansby Swanson led the way by hitting three home runs, including a grand slam in the eighth inning, when the Padres had waved the white flag and had a position player pitching.

Swanson has been on fire, and that’s honestly putting it lightly because the shortstop has now hit nine home runs in his last 13 games. That includes three multi-homer games and two in a row against the Padres, who were outscored 35-12 at Wrigley Field.

The Cubs’ home run derby began in the first inning, when Seiya Suzuki crushed a three-run homer against Walker Buehler. It was Suzuki’s 100th career home run with the Cubs, making him the fourth Japanese-born player to reach the century mark in home runs in MLB history.

Swanson’s first two home runs were also against Buehler, a solo shot in the second and then yet another bomb, 434 feet to center field in the third inning. Again, this turnaround by Swanson has been crazy, considering he went 43 games without a home run and was briefly benched for a mental reset in early June. Now, he’s on pace to hit more than 30 home runs, and Swanson currently leads the Cubs with 57 RBI, which is also ranked 10th among all hitters in baseball.

Lost in Swanson’s big day was Michael Conforto, who also hit two home runs. They sandwiched Pete Crow-Armstrong’s 19th home run of the year, which came against left-handed reliever Kyle Hart. And before you think these home runs in a blowout game come without merit, Hart had not given up a single home run all season.

The Padres essentially gave up by the time the bottom of the eighth inning came around, putting in catcher Rodolfo Durán on the mound. Swanson hit a grand slam, and Michael Busch tied a Cubs team record by hitting the eighth home run of the game against the position player.

What an insane ride it’s been following the 2026 Chicago Cubs. We’re talking about a team that had the best offense in the game for a month, only to become the worst for the next. Now? It is hot as hell at Wrigley Field, the ball is flying out, and the Cubs are once again looking like a dangerous team in the National League. The pitching staff is hanging on by a thread, but at least there are positive signs in the bullpen, and you would have to think that this recent run will give the front office enough of a push to make a serious effort to get help for the starting rotation at the trade deadline.

This was some straight-up scumbag, douchey behavior from the fans who decided it was a good idea to litter Wrigley Field following Monday night’s walk-off win over the San Diego Padres. The Chicago Cubs got to Mason Miller, getting some assistance from the wind that blew Seiya Suzuki’s fly ball up against the ivy in left field, which allowed Pete Crow-Armstrong to score the game-winning run in the ninth. It was the team’s 10th walk-off victory of the season, which leads all MLB teams. As his teammates surrounded Suzuki near the middle of the diamond, there were idiots throwing beer cans and at least one beer bat onto the outfield grass.

I cannot get on the side of those trying to justify these actions, and while it’s not a pearls-clutching moment or the worst thing to ever happen in a ballpark, it’s so fucking dumb and disrespectful.

That’s also not just a handful of people by the looks of it, either. Atrocious behavior that should be called out, especially if you did witness specific people participating in the act.

There were Cubs fans who captured people red-handed, and holy shit, this one picture was too on the nose. This was the stereotypical suburban (Naperville) kid who came to Chicago and was a dumbass.

There are ways you can celebrate an exciting, walk-off win without being a bad person. A fan shouldn’t do this at any ballpark, but to show up to Wrigley Field in Cubs gear and then throw shit on the field after a win is so stupid, disrespectful, and good for the other fans who did shame these people.

Always have to be some assholes out there making everyone else look bad. So yeah, call ’em out and get rid of this shit at Wrigley Field and every other stadium.

The Pete Crow-Armstrong discourse is so funny online because you would swear that, the way a lot of other fans talk about him, he either did something terrible off the field or was a very average player who is overhyped. And as much as they want it to be the latter, the Chicago Cubs center fielder just finished off June with another home run that cemented him among the gods in MLB history.

The Cubs clinched their season series against the San Diego Padres, beating them 9-7 at Wrigley Field on Tuesday night. Crow-Armstrong’s sixth-inning home run turned out to be important at the end, giving the Cubs some breathing room that was very much needed after the Padres climbed back to within two after a pair of home runs in the eighth.

The 11 home runs in June by Crow-Armstrong were the most by any Cubs player in a single calendar month since Nick Castellanos hit 11 in 28 games in Aug. 2019 after he was acquired from the Detroit Tigers at the trade deadline. Crow-Armstrong reached that mark in 26 games. He also became only the third player in Cubs history to hit at least 11 home runs in one month among players 24 or younger, joining Mr. Cub himself, Ernie Banks, and Kris Bryant, who accomplished the feat in June 2026.

But the home runs are just one part of how incredible and truly historic the month of June was for the Cubs’ star. In 26 games during June, Crow-Armstrong had a slash line of .381/.468/.781 in 124 plate appearances. The left-handed hitter added five doubles and two triples on top of the 11 home runs, while swiping eight bases. Yet, as we’ve discussed over the past few weeks, the biggest improvement in Crow-Armstrong’s approach has been his plate discipline, which you can see with his 13.7 BB% that yielded 17 walks in June.

And with that, Crow-Armstrong entered the same arena as Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig.

Overall, Crow-Armstrong now leads the Cubs with 18 home runs, a .284 batting average, .373 OBP, .515 SLG, and 20 stolen bases. He’s tied with Michael Busch for second in RBI with 46, second in runs scored behind Ian Happ with 54, and, everyone’s favorite stat, Crow-Armstrong will begin the month of July with a 5.1 fWAR, No. 1 among all position players in MLB.