With each passing day in the 2025 season, the Baltimore Orioles decision to trade young outfielder Kyle Stowers to the Miami Marlins, along with Connor Norby, for Trevor Rogers has looked worse for general manager Mike Elias. That feeling might be reaching a fever pitch now, though, after Stowers just made the All-Star Game and is on an all-time heater. But another thing that stands out is that the Marlins learned something vital that the Orioles clearly didn't, that trading Stowers would be a bad idea.
Make no mistake, when the Marlins learn to not trade someone, it has to be blatantly obvious that we're talking about a special talent. Stowers is rapidly developing into that right before Miami's eyes, though. And as the organization is prepared to sell at the trade deadline, Marlins insider Craig Mish is reporting that Stowers is at least one piece that won't be on the move.
The Miami Marlins will not be trading Kyle Stowers. The deadline will certainly have it’s fair share of rumors and discussions but he will not be a player they move.
— Craig Mish (@CraigMish) July 19, 2025
And when you're looking at the run that Stowers is currently on, even with the Marlins' unclear timeline for when they'll exit their perennial rebuild, it's not hard to understand why they think that the young outfielder could be a potential cornerstone.
For more news and rumors, check out MLB Insider Robert Murray’s work on The Baseball Insiders podcast, subscribe to The Moonshot, our weekly MLB newsletter, and join the discord to get the inside scoop during the MLB season.
Marlins learned what Orioles never did: Don't let Kyle Stowers go
Just in the two game sample size most recently, the games immediately before and after the All-Star break, Stowers has put up video-game numbers. In two games, the Marlins slugger has five home runs, eight hits, 11 RBI, and one of his home runs was of the walk-off variety to send the Royals packing on Friday night. Per OptaStats, he and Ty Cobb are the only players to hit those marks since RBI became an official stat in 1920.
It's not just been two games for Stowers, though. For the season, Stowers is slashing .298/.371/.563/.935 with 21 home runs, 13 doubles, three triples and 59 RBI. Moreover, since June 22, according to Just Baseball, the Marlins outfielder leads all of baseball in home runs, RBI, on-base and slugging percentage, OPS, and fWAR, among some other advanced metrics. All that is to say, he's been the best hitter in the sport for the better part of a month.
Now, to give the Orioles a shred of credit, Stowers struggled at the major-league level across 168 games with Baltimore, posting just a .643 OPS with only four home runs and striking out in about one-third of his plate appearances. At the same time, hindsight is 20-20, and Baltimore clearly didn't envision this type of upside for Stowers, but the fact that they traded a former top prospect in the organization for Rogers, a pitcher who ostensibly hasn't helped anything to this point, makes it all look that much worse.
It remains to be seen what the Marlins plan for Stowers long-term will be, namely if they have any chance of building anything meaningful around him if they keep him. But it's clear we're witnessing a star-level breakout, one that probably would've meant a whole lot more for the 2025 Orioles than Rogers, or than he does to this current iteration of the Marlins.