Carter Loewen’s journey to professional baseball has taken him from coast to coast and the Canuck continues to forge his path to the big leagues in the San Diego Padres organization.

The relief pitcher worked his way up to double-A in 2024 after arm injuries stunted his career progression since joining the Padres organization in 2020 as a non-drafted free agent. Despite being drafted by the Blue Jays out of high school, he decided on attending the University of Hawaii instead to further his development.

“I had the offer from Hawaii and a few other schools and I knew I wanted to get an education and that I wasn’t the healthiest at the time,” Loewen explains, talking with Blue Jays Nation. “Looking back at the time, I’m really glad I didn’t sign because I think I would have gotten eaten alive. I wasn’t who I am now, and I kind of had a feeling to go to school and develop and mature physically and mentally. And I mean, not a lot of people get to say they play in Hawaii, so that alone was a cool opportunity and something I couldn’t really pass up.”

Around the same time frame, the Abbotsford, B.C. native got the chance to pitch with the Canadian Junior National Team, getting an early peek at what pro baseball looked like in the process.

“As a high schooler from Canada, seeing what a professional baseball player looks like, even though it might only have been Rookie Ball at the time, you see what these guys are like, what they’re throwing, how the hitters are,” says Loewen. “It was a big eye-opener for me to see what that was like. It was cool being under Greg Hamilton and the guidance of all the staff there. That was a very important and pivotal memory in my baseball career.”

The 26-year-old Loewen’s progression through the Padres’ affiliates was derailed when he underwent Tommy John surgery in June of 2021, knocking him out for almost all of the 2022 season. Sometimes rehabbing an injury can end up being a benefit for a player, as he was able to learn to appreciate the little things about the game that he missed.

“I think that knowing you can’t do anything really forces you to slow down and take it day by day,” said Loewen. “That’s something that at first really challenged me because for the most part, it’s monotonous. It taught me a lot and it made me feel grateful or more grateful every time I’m on the mound because, you know, my elbow’s healthy, my shoulder’s healthy, I can still throw 95 and that’s that’s something to say in itself.”

After returning full time to the mound in 2023, Loewen flashed the strikeout stuff and pitching acumen that could ultimately get him to the big leagues. Across 34 appearances split between single-A and high-A, he produced a 2.20 ERA, 1.14 WHIP and 58 strikeouts in 49 innings. He pitched the entire 2024 season in double-A, where his numbers took a bit of a hit. His walk rate went up, leading to a 5.12 ERA and 1.47 WHIP. However, his strikeout rate also went up, as he produced a career best 11.5 K/9 mark across 38 appearances.

“Something I’ve really put a lot of focus on this off-season is commanding the baseball, especially with my off-speed pitches. It makes a big difference when you can win on the first pitch on an off-speed pitch, and then you can do whatever you want after. So that’s been a big focus leading up to spring training and going forward into the season.”

Loewen shares some parallels with Cleveland Guardians reliever Cade Smith, who exploded onto the scene with a microscopic 1.91 ERA in 2024 while leading all relief pitchers in fWAR (2.7). Both pitchers are from the same hometown, both went to Hawaii from 2018-2020, and both are big right-handed bullpen arms.

“I got the chance to catch up with him this offseason because we’re both from Abbotsford, so we trained down at the local park together and had some good chats. We talked about what the environment’s like, what it’s like going into a big league game. We’re both relievers, so I took some notes from that. I’m really happy to see he’s doing well and I hope he can continue to progress off last year.”

Loewen’s arsenal consists of a mid-to-upper 90’s fastball and sweeper that generates a lot of swing and miss. After realizing that his changeup wasn’t yielding the results he was looking for, he spent the offseason learning something new entirely.

“I have my sweeper and that’s kind of my put away pitch, but you know, I’ve been developing a splitter as another weapon because I realized my changeup wasn’t very good,” Loewen explains. “So I’m taking a page from Smith’s book and developing a splitter to get outs against lefties and hopefully throw it against righties. He throws a lot of splitters to righties and I see how he does it. This off-season, I took a lot of time to figure out how to throw it. I looked at a lot of slow-mo video, asked Cade how he throws his, and came into spring training and it was hit or miss. But now I can consistently get the shape that I want it to look like.”

Loewen will try to follow in the footsteps of another Canadian relief pitcher on the Guardians, Erik Sabrowski, as a guy who made it up to the majors in their later 20s after battling through injury issues. With some success to start the year, it wouldn’t be surprising to see the right-hander moved along quickly, with the chance to make it up to the big leagues by the end of the summer.

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