The Cubs' Catching Corps Has Been Good Again This Year. Can They Keep It Up?

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Image courtesy of © Vincent Carchietta-Imagn Images

Catching is rapidly becoming a position that is very difficult to project. In addition to all of the other modern responsibilities that a catcher has in terms of managing a pitching staff, the physical toll the position takes on the body makes it tough to post quality numbers year in and year out. 

In fact, this was the subject of a recent article at FanGraphs, by Ben Clemens. Within the article, which you should read, Clemens notes that every year, there are new players who pop up to be considered the best catcher in baseball. Yet, every year, one of them immediately falls off to be replaced by someone else. “It’s hard to stand out all the way at catcher, and it’s also hard to stay near the top for long,” he concluded. 

Over the past two seasons, the Cubs have artfully straddled a line at catcher. Carson Kelly and Miguel Amaya certainly aren’t big-name players like Cal Raleigh or Adley Rutschman, but they are both decent big-league backstops. Since the start of 2025, the Cubs are fifth in baseball in FanGraphs WAR from the catcher position, and they're 13th so far in 2026 alone. 

The Cubs have gotten some production from Reese McGuire and Moises Ballesteros behind the dish, too. However, given that Kelly and Amaya have received the super-majority of the playing time this season, we’ll focus on those guys. 

Neither is spectacular defensively, though they both manage to do pretty much everything well enough that it doesn’t significantly hamper their value. 

Catcher	Catcher Blocking Runs	Catcher Framing Runs	Catcher Stealing Runs
Carson Kelly	1	0	-3
Miguel Amaya	-1	0	1

The three metrics above, all of which come via Baseball Savant and are from 2026 only, convert a catcher’s ability to block pitches, frame pitches, and control the running game into runs. So, for example, Kelly’s pitch blocking has contributed one run to the Cubs this season, while Amaya’s has cost the Cubs one run. The only number up there that isn’t hanging right around average is Kelly’s -3 stealing runs. That's the third worst figure in baseball. He's caught just 11% of attempted basestealers this season, despite Baseball Savant estimating he should have caught 24% of them. 

Where both guys stand out a little bit more is at the plate. The team’s 107 wRC+ over the past two seasons is sixth in baseball. Their 104 wRC+ this season is ninth. Interestingly, both guys have maintained a similar level of offensive production between 2025 and 2026, but in completely different ways. 

Last season, Kelly rode a 23.9% pulled air rate to a .249/.333/.428 batting line, 115 wRC+, and 17 home runs. This season, his pulled air rate is down to 15.2%, which has resulted in significantly less power; he has just four home runs roughly halfway through the season. Yet, he's maintained a 116 wRC+, thanks to an elevated batting average of .280 and an on-base percentage of .366. Instead of the pulled balls in the air, the catcher’s ground ball rate has gone from 38.2% last season to 46.3% this year. He's seeing significantly better results on those ground balls this year, which unfortunately suggests to me that his current batting line might not be sustainable:

Year	Batting Average on Ground Balls
2025	.214
2026	.342

As for Amaya, he hit a robust .281/.314/.500 last season, good for a 124 wRC+. This year, his slugging average is down to .347, but like Kelly, his on-base percentage has increased—to .352, which is managing to keep his batting line above average with a 104 wRC+. 

In 2024, Amaya had just a 6.3% walk rate, and last year, it was just 3.9%. This year, it’s all the way up to 11.6%. That's because he has completely cut his swing rate on all pitches. Last season, he swung at 54% of the pitches he saw. This year, it’s just 43.7%. 

This has its drawbacks since Amaya is neglecting to swing at hittable pitches in the heart of the zone, too. Though, it all might be intentional: Amaya’s swing speed is down over two miles per hour, from 72.2 mph last season to 70 mph this year. He missed a large chunk of last season with an oblique injury. Perhaps he doesn’t feel like he can swing as hard coming off of that injury, and this is his way of compensating. 

Regardless, the Cubs’ catching duo has been a hallmark of stability over the past two seasons. Catcher is a position that is hard to remain consistently good at, yet the Cubs have managed to do just that with a couple of mostly unheralded guys. They'll need both players to remain productive if they want to stay afloat in the playoff race down the stretch.

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