Carson Kelly Had A Career Breakout At 30 – Can the Cubs' Catcher Do It Again In 2026?

For the first time in a handful of years, the Chicago Cubs entered an offseason with year-over-year certainty behind the plate. While there are still some questions about the long-term projectability of the catcher spot, the team knew that they'd have a tandem of Carson Kelly and Miguel Amaya holding down the position in 2026. Such certainty is largely due to the late-stage breakout from the former. 

Kelly's career-high 421 plate appearances did stem largely from Amaya working his way through multiple injuries. He was also able to spin such heavy work into career marks just about everywhere you look on the stat sheet, if not something very close to resembling one. Each of his .249 average and 9.6 percent barrel rate sat atop his output in each, while his .179 isolated power and 40.3 percent hard-hit rate each checked in as his best work since 2019. His .333 on-base percentage was his best since 2021. At no point over a full season has Kelly's fWAR been higher than the 2.6 figure he posted in his debut with the Cubs.

That 2025 output from Kelly has him firmly in the driver's seat to get the majority of the timeshare over Amaya, even with the latter's growth over the last couple of years. Each of FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus project him for 55 percent of the time at catcher to Amaya's 40. Projections thus far, however, don't love him. Each available model bears some level of regression virtually everywhere. Which leads to questions as to what Kelly did that made him so successful as a hitter in 2025 and whether it's something he can duplicate throughout the 2026 campaign. 

There were a few factors at play that allowed Kelly to discover the offensive success he had in 2025. The first was in his discipline. His 21.9 percent chase rate was his lowest in six years, while his 20.6 percent whiff rate was his best in seven. He also zeroed in on breaking and off-speed pitches, both of which represented his two highest rates of hard contact (42.2 percent for breaking pitches & 40.0 percent for off-speed).

In addition, there weren't necessarily mechanical changes at play, but there was at least one notable timing development: 

The negative indicator before the number indicates the pull side. Kelly leaned heavily into pull-side tendencies, which is logical considering the lower velocity at which those pitch types are approaching the plate. His Pull% grew from 41.4 percent in 2024 to 45.4 percent in 2025. As a timing mechanism, it's not something that's always going to be in a hitter's control. But if Kelly can continue to maintain the approach that allows him to turn around on pitches that are easier to pull as a general operating standard, then there's reason to believe in some carryover, especially given the fly-ball tendencies that increased along with his newfound love for pulling the ball.

Kelly's Pull% and fly-ball rate didn't necessarily grow in step with one another. But he did bump the fly-ball rate up about three percent (42.7). Those two factors resulted in a PullAIR% of 23.9, a figure that ranked 47th among 251 qualifying position players. The lead-up to it makes it repeatable; Kelly attacked breaking and off-speed pitches rather than relying on fastball contact that more so begets hard contact. That he's attacking those types of pitches lends itself to the notion of being replicable, even if you're worried about the bat slowing down from catcher that'll be 32 in July and is coming off his highest volume of work at the plate. 

The other things that Kelly did well are things he's always done. His 19.0 percent strikeout rate was a notch below the 20.2 percent mark for his career. His walk rate, at 10.7 percent, was in the neighborhood of a career 9.9 percent one. He's always been a relatively disciplined hitter relative to the position he plays. The difference is that he was able to parlay that discipline into something of actual value. 

And given that we're not talking about a hitter jumping all over fastballs or doing something vastly different on the mechanical side, it doesn't seem at all unrealistic for him to do it again in 2026.