Kyle Stowers' two-homer game seals Miami Marlins' walk-off win over the Royals

Miami Herald

2 days ago

Fresh off the All-Star break, expectations were high for the Miami Marlins.
Their 19-10 record over the last month of play was tied for the most in the Majors. Their star outfielder Kyle Stowers showed up big in Atlanta when he hit a home run for the NL in the All-Star swing-off. They started to look like a club that could close out a series.
But Stowers wasn't ready to rest on his laurels.
'We come into each day with a clean slate,' he said before Friday's 8-7 victory over the Kansas City Royals.
And he kept the momentum going all game long, notching two home runs versus the Royals and adding his third walk-off hit to his growing arsenal.
The fireworks started early. In the bottom of the first, with Jesús Sánchez already on the board after a 431-foot homer and Agustín Ramírez on first, Stowers smashed his 20th home run of the year to give Miami a 3–0 lead.
In the bottom of the third, Otto Lopez's RBI double sent Xavier Edwards home, and Stowers' second at-bat for the night, an RBI single, kept it going: 5-0 Marlins.
But the Royals didn't go quietly, and things got interesting in the top of the fourth.
John Rave's 422-foot, three-run homer highlighted the inning for Kansas City and cut Miami's lead to 5-4.
With just two strikeouts in his Friday performance on the mound, something's gotta give for Alcantara to overpower hitters in the way he once did. Over the 18 games he's started this season and 91 innings pitched, his ERA sits at 7.22.
In the top of the ninth, it seemed hope might be lost for the Marlins. Rave hit his second home run of the game.
But Stowers saved the day after the Royals took a 7-6 lead in the top of the 10th. Stowers came to the plate and did what he's done all season and 'calmed things down,' according to McCullough.
With a 394-foot two-run homer, his third walk-off, Stowers let it fly, sending himself and Javier Sanoja home.
And loanDepot erupted: sunflower seeds flying and a cooler of water dumped on the heads of everyone in the Marlins' dugout.
'I just love winning, man,' Stowers said after the game, holding back happy tears. 'That's what we want to bring here to Miami. That's what we all want to be a part of, that winning culture. And hopefully, eventually, [we'll] get into the playoffs, and absolutely, just dream one day about winning a World Series.'
Right-handed starting pitcher Sandy Alcantara allowed four runs on eight hits and two walks.
It's the lukewarm performance we've seen from the former Cy Young Award winner all season as he continues to recover from his late-2023 Tommy John surgery. It might even be Alcantara's last time on the mound as a Marlin, as his trade rumors continue to swirl.
'[Alcantara] has continued to just put his head down and go work, and the results have not followed at times,' Marlins manager Clayton McCullough said before the game. 'We expect Sandy to continue to go out there and compete. And we believe that the results are going to trend over [a] start-to-start basis here as we start the second half. If he pounds the strike zone, like we all know that he's capable of doing, [I] believe that in turn, those results will follow.'
THIS AND THAT
▪ Since 1901, two players in the League have recorded at least eight hits, five home runs, and 11 RBI in a two-game span: Ty Cobb in 1925 from May 5-6 and Kyle Stowers from July 13 and 18 in 2025.
Sánchez's home run in the bottom of the first inning gave him the fourth-most home runs in franchise history for a left-handed hitter.
▪ In the bottom of the ninth with the score tied at 5-5, Graham Pauley notched his first career stolen base.
▪ After leaving the first game of the Baltimore Orioles series early due to a right elbow injury, right handed starting pitcher Edward Cabrera is expected to return to the mound and pitch in the Marlins' upcoming homestand.