After the Chicago Cubs crashed out at the end of the 2019 season, Nico Hoerner gave such an honest and accurate assessment of the club’s performance that team executive Jed Hoyer still distinctly remembers the exit meeting years later.
It didn’t matter that Hoerner had just made his major-league debut, and only because a series of September injuries forced the Cubs to scramble for middle infield coverage. With his minor-league season already over, Hoerner got off the couch in his family’s Bay Area home and used his powers of observation.
“He described the dynamic in our clubhouse, and talked more insightfully about the things we needed to improve on and the things we could do better than any player we brought in,” Hoyer said. “We were like, ‘Oh, my God, this guy has been here for 20 days and he’s so insightful, so thoughtful and so team-oriented.’”
Hoyer, who’s now Chicago’s president of baseball operations, relayed that anecdote at the start of the 2023 season, after Hoerner had signed a three-year, $35 million contract extension. Without that deal, Hoerner could have been days away from reaching free agency, coming off a 6-WAR season and his first true playoff experience.
In many ways, the 2025 Cubs became the type of team that Hoerner once envisioned, a focused and connected group that restored the big-game energy to Wrigley Field. Strong up the middle, the Cubs featured Hoerner at second base, plus five more defenders who became Gold Glove finalists. That list does not even include shortstop Dansby Swanson, a two-time Gold Glove winner.
Fast, athletic and instinctual, Hoerner embodied a 92-win team that studied the game and concentrated on the little details within each series. Educated at Stanford University, he has an ability to clearly see the big picture.
Nico Hoerner goes SOARING 🤯 pic.twitter.com/cGFampHfM6
— MLB (@MLB) September 27, 2025
Without complaint, Hoerner moved off shortstop to accommodate Swanson when he signed a seven-year, $177 million contract after the 2022 season. To improve the flow at a renovated Wrigley Field, Hoerner made suggestions to redesign the home dugout and bring players and coaches closer together. In moments of frustration, young center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong pointed to Hoerner as a role model.
“I know, right now, the work isn’t paying off for me,” Crow-Armstrong wrote in a September essay for The Players’ Tribune. “I’ve been talking to Nico about that a lot lately. He’s the most methodical, hardest-working guy I’ve ever been around. And he’s locked the f— in. Always.
“He steps into the box with this fierceness about him. I think we both have that. I love this game more than anything. I want to be great more than anything. I mean that s—. But I think what Nico has, that I don’t yet, is the ability to ride the lows, to stay cool and calm, and trust the work, even when it’s not paying off.”
At this time last year, Hoerner was coming off a good-but-not-great season and recovering from flexor tendon surgery. The procedure addressed the discomfort in his right forearm, allowing him to regain the ability to play shortstop at a high level. It also slowed one offseason idea that had been bandied about — trading Hoerner to improve other areas of the roster in the baseball industry’s version of arbitrage.
After staying back in Arizona and missing the season-opening trip to Japan, Hoerner played in 164 out of 168 games (including the playoffs). The pressure of October baseball magnified his strengths as an elite contact hitter (13-for-31 over two postseason rounds), an aggressive base runner and a game-changing defender.
“One thing that can be a challenge throughout the 162 is, mentally, actually expecting the ball to be hit to you every single pitch,” Hoerner said. “It sounds kind of silly, but there’s just a level of focus and readiness beyond the skills themselves that puts you in a great place to make plays. And I think, in some ways, the postseason continues to bring that out of you naturally, where the heightened focus and intensity puts you in a really great place to just go compete.”
“I haven’t played in real playoff baseball like this before; it really is the best part of this sport. You share a lot emotionally with people over the course of the season.”
Nico Hoerner on the 2025 season. pic.twitter.com/ixZQlehRxk
— Marquee Sports Network (@WatchMarquee) October 12, 2025
The day after the Cubs clinched their first playoff appearance in five years, Cubs manager Craig Counsell hesitated when a reporter used a basketball term to ask if Hoerner is one of baseball’s biggest “glue guys.”
“It depends on your definition,” Counsell said. “He might be a little better than that, in my definition. Nico’s been great.”
In other words, Hoerner doesn’t just do the little things or get by on baseball IQ.
Statcast placed him in the 96th, 97th, 98th or 99th percentile in base-running value, fielding value, fielding range, and strikeout and whiff percentages, respectively. He finished the regular season with a .297 batting average, 178 hits and 29 stolen bases. With runners in scoring position, he hit .371, which tied for second in the majors.
“He’s just put together a complete season,” Counsell said. “That’s why Nico’s such a special player, because you’re getting something from all parts of the game. He impacts the game on the bases, and with his unique abilities as a hitter. His defense is Gold Glove-caliber every single year.
“There’s a lot of baseball at a high level in a lot of areas.”
What would that be worth on the open market?
The Cubs could try to do another contract extension with Hoerner, a homegrown talent who has been — by far — the most productive player selected in the first round of the 2018 draft. With the current labor deal set to expire after the 2026 season, both sides could wait to see what the landscape looks like after the next collective bargaining agreement.
By that point, Hoerner could also market himself as a Gold Glove second baseman with a proven track record at shortstop, traditionally a more valuable and expensive position to fill.
With a lockout widely anticipated, it’s not a total coincidence that the Cubs have several key players potentially positioned to become free agents after the 2026 season: Hoerner, Ian Happ, Seiya Suzuki, Carson Kelly, Jameson Taillon and Matthew Boyd. For now, Swanson is the only Cubs player signed beyond 2026 on a fully guaranteed deal.
This upcoming class of free agents includes ex-Cub Kyle Schwarber and three-time batting champion Luis Arraez, two very different types of players who will be reevaluated at a time when home runs are king and .300 hitters are disappearing.
Hoerner, 28, does not have that much natural power or off-the-charts bat speed, but he is a well-rounded player.
“I’m sure different organizations will have different perspectives,” Hoerner said. “They all have their own models, and they tend to value similar things, but you definitely see organizations go for certain trends over others. It’s always a question of what type of skill sets are going to hold on or improve, or let things decline as well.
“You look at Kyle Schwarber and it’s very easy to believe in him continuing to walk and slug deep into his 30s. At least for me, just knowing how hard he takes care of his body and his body of work and also that he’s done it in the playoffs, I feel like that matters.
“But at the end of the day, if you’re a player who takes away runs and helps score runs, and you constantly do that over and over every year, then I think most models would like that.”
