'Be that guy': Stowers' journey from imitating brothers to All-Star

It’s not uncommon for a younger sibling to look up to his older brothers.

Marlins All-Star outfielder Kyle Stowers took it a step further as a kid growing up in El Cajon, Calif. Born right-handed, Stowers began mirroring his older brothers, Michael and Barrett, who are eight and five years his senior, and wound up batting and throwing left-handed.

“Always, always wanted to be like them,” their mother Sheri Copeland said. “I didn't realize it until [Kyle] was getting older. He just kept doing it left when we put the little ball on the tee for him or they pitched to him. Since -- I'm not even making this up -- 18 months, 2 years old, he was playing out there with them.”

And the older siblings didn’t take it easy on Stowers, who believes being included paid off in the long run. As early as elementary school, Copeland would hear from Stowers’ coaches about his big league potential.

But in eighth grade, Stowers quit baseball and focused on basketball. At that juncture in his life, he needed a break from the sport he was better at because his heart wasn’t in it. For the first time, Stowers doubted his future in baseball.

After a year's hiatus, Stowers returned to the diamond and made the varsity team at Christian High School. Eventually, Stanford would come calling. Although Stowers was one of two freshman Opening Day starters, he would lose his spot due to poor performance. The same thing happened again as a sophomore.

Despite this, head coach David Esquer stuck with Stowers. Following an especially tough series, hitting coach Tommy Nicholson texted him about showing up the next day for extra work.

“I remember kind of thinking, ‘Well, maybe I should just pitch,’” said Stowers, who was also a hard-throwing lefty pitcher at the time. “Next series had a good series, and the rest is history.”

Baltimore selected Stowers as an outfielder in the second round of the 2019 Draft, but he struggled out of the gate -- a recurring theme for him -- whether it be in college, professional baseball or upon his arrival in Miami. Like those in charge at Stanford, the Orioles believed in Stowers the batter and weren’t ready to convert him into a pitcher.

According to Connor Norby, who joined the Marlins alongside Stowers in the Trevor Rogers trade, Stowers was the poster boy at Baltimore’s hitting camps. A particular video package showed Stowers striking out against then-top prospect Shane Baz on a heater up, then crushing the same pitch in the next matchup.

“People kind of wrote him off a long time ago, especially Baltimore, just because he wasn't the first-round Draft pick or whatever,” Norby said. “When I first met Stowie, he was Organizational Player of the Year, and that included a system with Gunnar [Henderson], [Jordan] Westburg, Adley [Rutschman], Joey Ortiz, guys like that, right? He was the Orioles’ Player of the Year, and he mashed. … It was all about adjustments. That's Kyle Stowers.”

Adjustments proved difficult while shuttling back and forth between the Majors and Minors from 2022 to 2024. It bled into this spring, when Stowers didn’t know whether he would make the club out of camp and met up with Marlins hitting coaches Pedro Guerrero and Derek Shomon. Guerrero would show video of one of Stowers’ Triple-A homers in 2023.

Be that guy.

The 27-year-old Stowers has done just that, blossoming into a first-time All-Star. Hours before his first Opening Day, which culminated in a walk-off hit, Stowers shared a photo of himself as a Little Leaguer in the family chat. He didn’t want to forget about that little kid imitating his brothers. Except now, Stowers has found his own swing.

“It was actually very cathartic, because I used to discount everything I did in Triple-A, and be like, ‘Oh, I need to change if I'm going to have success at the big league level,’” Stowers said. “And what Pedro helped teach me in that moment was that guy was always good enough, and that I was always good enough to compete in the big leagues. It made me look back at my Triple-A memories a lot more fondly.

“When you have struggles in the big leagues, you feel like you need to do something differently. The moment that Pedro showed me that swing, it's like, ‘Oh, I can go be that guy.’ And really, what it was, was that I just needed to go be myself. Myself was good enough to have success at the big league level.”