Guardians drop Steven Kwan out of leadoff spot as trade candidate struggles to find footing

Kwan, who has a .477 OPS in May, was moved out of the leadoff spot for the first time in nearly four years on Saturday

The Cleveland Guardians are in first place, but that doesn't mean they're firing on all cylinders. Cleveland has demoted -- at least temporarily -- the struggling Steven Kwan out of the leadoff spot for the first time in almost four years. Kwan will bat sixth against the Cincinnati Reds at Progressive Field on Saturday night. 

"I think we've seen some really good signs from Kwany (recently)," manager Stephen Vogt said earlier this week (via the Chronicle-Telegram). "He's had a couple games where he's gotten a couple hits, couple walks over the weekend ... Kwany's working and continuing to play great defense. Kwany's one of our best players. We go when he goes."

Saturday will be Kwan's first start outside the leadoff spot since June 18, 2022, when he batted eighth as a rookie. Here is the club's lineup for Saturday's game:

Tonight's lineup.#GuardsBall pic.twitter.com/He4TwlsJwv

— Cleveland Guardians (@CleGuardians) May 16, 2026

Kwan enters play Saturday hitting .201/.308/.258 overall, and he's been much worse in May (.477 OPS) than he was in April (.602 OPS). He had hit leadoff in 41 of Cleveland's first 46 games. Angel Martínez (four) and Daniel Schneemann (one) started the other five games at leadoff, when Kwan was out of the lineup completely, rather than moved down in the order.

Never a power hitter or exit-velocity guy, Kwan's offensive game is built around plate discipline and ripping line drives to all fields. The plate discipline has been there -- Kwan has 23 walks and 21 strikeouts -- though the line drives have not:

2024

27.8%

38.5%

2025

29.0%

39.7%

2026

22.0%

31.9%

MLB average

24.6%

33.3%

Sweet spot rate is the percentage of batted balls in the 8-32 degree launch angle range, which is optimal. Kwan's drop from 39.7% last year to 31.9% this year is enormous. That takes him from the top 10% of the league into the bottom 35%. Kwan's line drives have been replaced by pop ups, which are essentially automatic outs, and more ground balls. It's a bad combination.

Hitters who rely on batting average rather than power can have large swings in performance year to year. Sure enough, Kwan's OPS fluctuated from .772 to .710 to .793 to .705 from 2022-25, and now it's .566 in 2026. Kwan is not actually this bad. Unless he's playing through an injury we don't know about, the under-the-hood numbers suggest his swing is out of whack.

The Guardians had serious trade talks involving Kwan at last summer's deadline and reportedly came close to sending him to the Los Angeles Dodgers before simply running out of the time to complete the deal. There was more trade chatter over the winter and it stands to reason Cleveland will listen again at this summer's trade deadline. It never hurts to listen, right?

Kwan, 28, will be a free agent after 2027, so the Guardians don't have to move him now. If no one meets their asking price, they can keep him next year, and try the trade market again. That said, teams will pay more for two postseason runs of Kwan rather than one. Even with this slump, Cleveland might get more in return this summer than in the offseason.

The Guardians enter play Saturday in first place with a 24-22 record. They erased a 15 ½-game deficit last season to win the AL Central via tiebreaker over the Detroit Tigers.