CHICAGO — Pete Crow-Armstrong coiled back in the box and exploded forward, connecting to send another ball high into the air towards right field. For a moment, it felt like things stood still on a picture-perfect Friday afternoon at Wrigley Field.

Crow-Armstrong watched the ball, leaning as if he could actually will the ball to stay fair. While he watched, so did 40,171 fans at Wrigley Field and thousands more on TV in the Crosstown Series opener.

As the ball settled into the Budweiser bleachers in right field — no doubt helped (at least in part) by the wind pushing it fair — it seemed like it was a punctuation mark, on the game as well as Crow-Armstrong’s star-making turn with the Cubs.

It was yet another moment in a weekend full of them for Crow-Armstrong. As the Cubs pulled off a sweep, they scored 26 runs and he accounted for nearly half of them on his own (eight RBI, four runs scored).

The weekend made one thing clear: Crow-Armstrong has firmly established himself as one of the game’s best players right now. Forget talk of just making the All-Star Game. As the calendar creeps toward June, Crow-Armstrong should be in strong contention to start the Midsummer Classic and he is absolutely in the early season conversation for National League MVP.

[Jed Hoyer weighs in on the star power of Pete Crow-Armstrong]

Quite the turnaround after the way Crow-Armstrong began the season (.197 AVG, .521 OPS, 0 HR through April 12).

Since that date, no player in MLB has hit more home runs than Crow-Armstrong’s 12 (Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani also has 12 homers in that stretch).

And it doesn’t feel like it’s a fluke by any means.

In a little over a month’s time, Crow-Armstrong has gone from a player whose ceiling was a complete unknown to one of the game’s most exciting talents and the league’s next superstar.

After the big weekend, he is now slashing .290/.325/.585 (.910 OPS) on the season.

Over a full 162-game slate, Crow-Armstrong is on pace for:

41 homers
48 stolen bases
130 RBI
124 runs

“He’s playing at a really high level right now,” Cubs manager Craig Counsell said. “He’s driving the ball in the air. That’s led to the home runs, obviously. And it’s fun to watch.

“It’s fun to see a player take another step. He’s taken a step up defensively. He’s taken a big step offensively. It’s an impact player. The ability for the home run now, I think that’s probably a pretty big surprise. But you need surprises, so it’s an important one.”

As Counsell said, nobody was expecting a power surge like this from Crow-Armstrong. The Cubs always believed in his immense talent and potential, but this is a player with blazing speed who hit 10 homers in 123 games as a rookie last season. In the minors, he never hit more than 20 in a season.

At 23, Crow-Armstrong is now coming into his own.

He very well may slow down in the power department and maybe he doesn’t reach the 40-homer plateau this season. But the main point here is: That suddenly does not seem like a reach.

The question now becomes: How high does his ceiling go?

No player in baseball this season has enjoyed a bigger breakout than Crow-Armstrong.

“It’s special. It’s awesome,” Cubs catcher Carson Kelly said. “Every time he comes up to the plate, you know something awesome might happen. You’re on the edge of your seat just watching him.”

Cubs players have enjoyed having a front row seat to Crow-Armstrong’s ascension.

“He’s a really special player,” Cubs rookie pitcher Cade Horton said. “I watched him play in high school. I always knew he was going to be a star. But this year, he’s really found a groove, and it’s awesome to watch.”

And believe it or not, the Cubs actually think there is more left in the tank with Crow-Armstrong.

He is an elite defender in center field and an elite runner on the basepaths. His 2.8 fWAR ranks second in the entire league behind only Aaron Judge (4.0 WAR).

But Crow-Armstrong might just be scratching the surface of what he can accomplish.

“I think he would say as well that he wants to swing at more strikes and get on base a little bit more,” Cubs GM Carter Hawkins said in “Cubs Live!” Sunday. “And as he does that, he’s going to get more pitches in the zone to drive.

“But if he continues to do what he’s doing and stay on the path he’s on, he’s going to produce a lot of runs for us, with his bat and with his legs and [save runs] with his glove. Pretty excited about the progress so far.”

Through it all, the Cubs have been impressed with how Crow-Armstrong has handled the sudden rise to stardom.

“He’s got a special personality about him,” Cubs bench coach Ryan Flaherty said. “I got a 5-year-old son and the way that Pete treats him is special. The way he speaks and how humble he is, he’s a star. Not every star is like that.”

For Crow-Armstrong, he is simply enjoying the moment and trying to stay grounded. He brushed aside any notion of MVP or All-Star conversation in a postgame scrum.

He’s just happy to help produce wins for his team.

“I love walking to the plate at Wrigley,” he said. “It’s a blast. This feeling is fleeting. It doesn’t always stay. So I’m not really thinking about that that much.”