MLB Insider Projects Former Cardinal as Fit with San Diego Padres at Deadline

While June is still fairly new, the MLB Trade Deadline is looming--especially in the National League. The Senior Circuit is filled with some of the all-around best teams in baseball (aside from former Stanford product A.J. Hinch's Detroit Tigers of course) and that could lead to more activity on the NL side of the standings.

In a recent post from The Athletic, former GM and MLB insider Jim Bowden provided a list of names that could be fits for contending teams' biggest needs. Among that list was former Stanford Cardinal Kyle Stowers, who was among the group that could slot in nicely with the San Diego Padres in left field.

Entering play on Wednesday, the Padres are 38-28 on the season, just one game back of the Los Angeles Dodgers in the NL West. The problem is, in between themselves and the Dodgers are the San Francisco Giants, who are only a half-game back of LA.

These two teams also possess the first and second wild-card spots in the postseason hunt, but there are four teams on the outside looking in that are within 5.5 games of San Diego.

The Padres offense ranks No. 19 overall in wRC+ with a 97 (100 is league average), so a boost offensively is certainly in order. Following the departure of Jurickson Profar during the offseason, the Padres rank No. 29 in left field wRC+ with a 51--49% below league average. Only the Pittsburgh Pirates' 49 is worse, and they aren't close to contending.

Tyler Wade has been taking the playing time against right-handers, while Brandon Lockridge is playing against lefties. This is because Jason Heyward is currently down with a strained oblique, but even when he was healthy his production was still 61% below league average.

It's clear that San Diego needs an upgrade.

Stowers has been one of the ten best left fielders in the game this season, posting a 128 wRC+ (28% above league average), and would bring a little bit of power to the position for the Pads. Stowers has slammed ten homers this season and driven in 33 RBI for a weak Miami Marlins club. One of those home runs was a walk-off grand slam against A's closer Mason Miller.

Overall he's batting .280 with a .347 OBP in what has been a breakout season for the 27-year-old. The added bonus to acquiring Stowers would be that he doesn't have a ton of MLB service time, so he won't even be arbitration eligible until 2027, and won't reach free agency until after the 2029 campaign.

In theory, that would also increase the price tag to acquire him, but since he has been on a heater to begin the 2025 campaign and hasn't had similar production in his parts of three previous seasons in the big leagues with the Baltimore Orioles, then the asking price likely wouldn't be astronomical.

That's the good news. The bad news is that his defense in left is roughly league average, with Stowers racking up a -1 Outs Above Average thus far in 2025. He makes up for that a bit with a strong arm, which ranks in the 89th percentile among all fielders.

Stowers will strike out a chase quite a bit, which could be an issue in the postseason when he'd be facing the best pitchers in the game on a consistent basis, but he also has more power than any of the Padres' current options as well, which could also turn around a game or a series in October.

Given the cost of acquisition and the talent that Stowers posseses, he could be a terrific under-the-radar addition to a club in the coming weeks. Given that the Marlins are 25-40 this season, the likelihood that he gets moved is fairly high.