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A throwing arm for Migual Amaya
I firmly believe that Miguel Amaya is better than any option the Cubs had in free agency this offseason. Amaya was one of the best-hitting catchers in the league following his, posting a 124 wRC from July 7 onward, and he seems to manage the staff well. However, watching him deal with base stealers was genuinely horrifying in '24 and teams are going to come out of the gates hard against the young catcher in '25. Elly de la Cruz wakes up smiling every day he gets to play the Cubs.
There was some sense that Amaya was improving defensively alongside the bat in the second half of the year, but he was pretty miserable in any metric related to mitigating base stealing. He has one of the weakest arms in the game, one of the worst exchange times, and one of the worst pop times. In lieu of a new arm waiting under Amaya's tree, let's wish for an offseason of development on any of those metrics.