Cody Bellinger and Pete Crow-Armstrong were named the 2026 Platinum Glove Award winners on Friday night in New York City, putting the Yankees and Cubs atop MLB’s defensive honors for the season. Crow-Armstrong’s selection was the more striking of the two: he became the first National League center fielder to win the Platinum Glove.
The award is drawn from the Gold Glove winners, then decided through fan voting and Society for American Baseball Research defensive analytics. That process lifted Crow-Armstrong, who led MLB with 26 outs above average and 23 runs prevented, and was credited with 16 defensive runs saved. Bellinger, meanwhile, collected the American League honor after a season in which he posted six outs above average, prevented six runs and recorded 20 defensive runs saved.
For Crow-Armstrong, the night carried more weight than a standard trophy case entry. He became the second Cubs player to win the honor after Anthony Rizzo in 2011, and he enters the final stretch of award season as a finalist for the National League MVP award. That keeps alive the possibility that he could become the first player to win a Platinum Glove and an MVP in the same season, a combination no one has reached since the award was founded in 2011.
The selection was not without debate. Some fans argued that other Gold Glove winners should have been considered, including Boston Red Sox center fielder Ceddanne Rafaela. But the process narrows the field to Gold Glove winners before fan voting and SABR’s defensive measures determine the Platinum Glove winners, and Crow-Armstrong’s numbers gave him the strongest case in the National League group.
Bellinger is the second Yankees player to earn the American League honor after Jose Trevino in 2022. The rest of the Gold Glove field included Tanner Bibee, Dillon Dingler, Christian Walker, Cole Young, Caleb Durbin, Taylor Walls, Wilyer Abreu and Ezequiel Duran in the American League, along with Nolan McLean, Gabriel Moreno, Matt Olson, Brice Turang, Alex Bregman, Geraldo Perdomo, Jackson Chourio, Corbin Carroll and Mauricio Dubón in the National League. The rest of baseball award season continues in November, with All-MLB Teams set for Nov. 11, BBWAA MVP awards on Nov. 12 and Silver Slugger Awards on Nov. 17.
