Why Matt Shaw's defensive wizardry at third base is turning heads around the league

Matt Shaw has had one of the wildest rookie seasons in recent Cubs history.

He slumped badly out of the gates, necessitating a demotion to Triple-A Iowa as he worked on correcting his swing and huge leg kick.

His return to Chicago came with mixed results, and by the All-Star break, he was slashing .198/.276/.280, good for a 60 wRC+. Simply put, he was a disaster at the plate, and

Luckily, he's turned things around in a big way since then, pulling the ball far more often while settling in against major league pitching. In the second half, the rookie third baseman is batting .288/.330/.654, which comes out to a 168 wRC+ that leads the Cubs by a wide margin.

However, Shaw's biggest contributions haven't come at the plate—they've come in the field.

Matt Shaw emerging as a top-flight defensive third baseman for Cubs

While his bat has been up-and-down this season, Shaw has quietly been excellent with his glove all year.

Entering this weekend, he's only played the 13th-most innings in the league at the hot corner in 2025 (793.0), and yet he ranks second in Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) with 10. He is one of just two third basemen in double digits in that metric this year, behind all-universe defender Ke'Bryan Hayes.

Unfortunately, Hayes' presence in the Senior Circuit will likely preclude Shaw from winning a Gold Glove in his rookie campaign. Still, it's a testament to his work at the hot corner that he'll almost certainly be a finalist for the award.

Considering that Shaw only started playing the position full-time in 2024 -- he split his time primarily between shortstop and second base in college -- it's hard not to get excited about future projections regarding his glove.

Now, it is worth noting that FanGraphs' Fielding Run Value (FRV) and Statcast's Outs Above Average (OAA) have Shaw pinned as a net-negative contributor on defense (-2 OAA, -1 FRV) as the weekend started. Besides Manny Machado, he is the only third baseman in baseball this season with a positive DRS and negative figures in FRV and OAA.

Those numbers shouldn't be too concerning, though. They're heavily skewed by his defensive struggles to open the campaign, when he was still learning the position and having to do so at the major league level. Remember, he had made three errors by the time the Cubs had swept the Athletics... on April 2.

He's made just three errors since then, and DRS has rewarded him for his stability since the first few weeks of the season. He probably won't get enough love in the voting process to supplant Hayes at the National League's premier defensive third baseman, but the fact that he's in the conversation at all is a promising sign for the Cubs' sterling rookie.