Crow-Armstrong and Bellinger Win Platinum Gloves as Cubs and Jays Take Team Gold

Baseball saved its best defensive news for late on a Friday night. At the Gold Glove ceremony in New York, Rawlings named Pete Crow-Armstrong and Cody Bellinger the 2026 Platinum Glove winners — the finest fielders in the National and American Leagues — and the numbers behind both choices were not close. Crow-Armstrong's case was the easier one to make. The 24-year-old Chicago Cubs centre fielder led every qualified outfielder in baseball with 25 outs above average, nine clear of the next man, Boston's Ceddanne Rafaela. He finished in the 100th percentile for outfield range, the 93rd percentile for arm value and the 90th for arm strength, a combination of speed, route-running and throwing that no other outfielder in the game could match. He is the first National League centre fielder to win the Platinum Glove since the award was created in 2011, and the first centre fielder from either league to take it since Minnesota's Byron Buxton in 2017. Only Anthony Rizzo, back in 2011, had won it for the Cubs before him. It caps a season in which Crow-Armstrong announced himself as one of the game's brightest young stars, hitting .280 with 45 home runs, 107 RBIs and 41 stolen bases, and winning his second straight Gold Glove in centre field. The Platinum Glove is chosen from the ten Gold Glove winners in each league, with the winner decided by a combination of the fan vote and the SABR Defensive Index — and this year the analytics and the eye test agreed completely. Bellinger's win was just as emphatic in its own way. The 31-year-old New York Yankees left fielder tallied 21 defensive runs saved, easily the most among American League left fielders, with eight outfield assists and six outs above average, finishing above the 91st percentile in both range and arm strength. It was his second career Gold Glove, and he is only the second Yankee ever to win a Platinum Glove, after catcher Jose Trevino in 2022. For a player who won the National League MVP in 2019 and has rebuilt his career in the Bronx, it is another reminder of how complete his game has become. The team awards told a similar story of dominance. Toronto took the American League team Gold Glove for the third time in four seasons, with 51 defensive runs saved as a team, the third most in the Junior Circuit — and did it without a single individual Gold Glove winner on the roster. Chicago repeated as the National League team winner, and the Cubs' numbers were staggering: just 61 errors all season, by far the fewest in the majors, and an MLB-best 115 defensive runs saved. Crow-Armstrong and third baseman Alex Bregman were their two individual Gold Glove winners. There was one more honour handed out on the night. Kansas City shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. won the Heart & Hustle Award for the third straight year, the prize given to the player who best embodies the spirit of the game. The awards season is only getting started. The All-MLB Teams will be announced on November 11, the BBWAA MVP awards follow on November 12, and the Silver Slugger Awards arrive on November 17. But for one Friday night in New York, the game's best gloves had the stage to themselves — and Crow-Armstrong, the kid with the bleached hair and the endless range, stood at the front of it.