MIAMI -- Otto Lopez had already put himself in elite company before the All-Star announcement ever arrived. He was leading MLB in batting average and hits, and still, he wasn’t about to tempt fate.
So when he and his wife, Marle, went shopping before the Marlins’ recent three-city road trip, Lopez hesitated at AMIRI while looking at suits. Making an All-Star team had been a dream for years, but he wasn’t ready to assume it was happening.
Marle didn’t let him off the hook.
“I kept telling him, ‘You might not make it through the fan vote, but you deserve to be there, and you have to believe in yourself, and you have to believe in the process, and how hard you worked, and that people see what we see in you,’” Marle said. “‘If you believe in yourself, and you see that in yourself, then go buy yourself a suit, because you belong there.’”
Lopez eventually bought a dark blue custom fit. On the second-to-last day of that trip, he got the news: he was an All-Star for the first time, and the fourth shortstop in Marlins history to earn the honor, joining Hanley Ramirez (2008-10), Alex Gonzalez (1999) and Edgar Renteria (1998).
That moment fit the arc of Lopez’s story. This wasn’t a sudden leap. It was the latest payoff in a career that kept moving because people around him kept seeing something he had not yet fully reached.
When the Giants acquired him for cash at the start of 2024 Spring Training after he had bounced around the Blue Jays’ organization, Lopez’s path still had plenty of uncertainty. On April 1, he was boarding Triple-A Sacramento’s bus at Sutter Health Park when he learned San Francisco had designated him for assignment.
“When I finally got DFA'd, it was a tough moment, I would say,” said Lopez, who told the story at that same West Sacramento ballpark shortly after becoming a first-time All-Star. “Sat down to myself, and I prayed a lot. I asked God, if he's willing to give me the opportunity again to be in an MLB stadium, I would give my all, and that's what happened after that."
Three days later, Miami claimed him off waivers.
At the time, Marle was back in Orlando, Fla., pregnant with the couple’s first child. Before the Marlins stepped in, she worried Lopez would be stuck on the other side of the country and miss the birth.
“I was like, ‘Don't mess this up. You need to stay on this team, because I'm super pregnant, and you're so close now,’” Marle recalled.
Lopez spent 10 games at Triple-A Jacksonville to open his Marlins run, then joined the big league club for good. Xavier Edwards, his double-play partner, remembered him from 2019, when they were coming up with Lansing and Fort Wayne, respectively. Lopez was already standing out then on a roster that included eventual two-time All-Star Alejandro Kirk and Marlins teammate Griffin Conine.
“It was Low-A,” Edwards said. “Nobody is really anything yet, but I always knew he could hit.
You could just tell by his swings. He had a pretty flat swing, made good swing decisions.
He could hit pretty much anything. He always had good bat-to-ball skills, so I knew he was a good hitter.”
Conine saw the same thing.
"I don't want to say he didn't grow, but it was the same guy. The way he hit was so similar.
He just was a pure hitter, pure defender. You just saw all that from a young age.
He's matured, developed, but it was there always. It was like he was always going to be this guy."
Lopez also had a familiar guide waiting for him once he arrived in Miami. During the 2024 offseason, he reunited with hitting coach Pedro Guerrero, after first working together while representing the Dominican Republic in the 2019 WBSC Premier12 and again during 2024 Spring Training with the Giants. Back then, Lopez was at second base, with future All-Star Geraldo Perdomo at shortstop.
“They just had really high things to say about him, like, ‘He makes a ton of contact, he's going to play in the big leagues, needs some arm strength’ and things like that,” Guerrero said. “The second time I saw him with the Giants, it was a completely 180-degree change.
He put on so much muscle. His body just looked built.
He definitely worked his butt off to get stronger.”
Guerrero, along with assistant hitting coaches Chris Hess and Corbin Day, helped sharpen Lopez’s mechanics and build his confidence, turning him into one of the game’s elite batters.
Miami also believed there was more in the tank. The Marlins were not satisfied with Lopez becoming the franchise’s first shortstop to hit at least 15 homers since Ramirez in 2010.
They pushed him to change his stance, and this spring they told him he could be an All-Star. Lopez said he would do anything to become one.
Mission accomplished.
“A couple years ago, Otto wasn't a name that many people around the sport were talking about,” manager Clayton McCullough said. “He's found a home here, and he's taken advantage of his opportunity.
He exemplifies so much about what we're about. He's incredibly accountable, he works hard.
He's getting better every year.”
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