Atlanta Braves lefty reliever search: 5 names to know

Borderline unfair

The Rays Jose Alvarado surprised me with his appearance in the list, probably because my interest in the American League ranks just below barefoot snowboarding.

Alvarado uses his 6 foot 2 inch, 245-pound frame to generate a fastball that’s extremely hard to hit – as in two hits off 120 fastballs thrown this season. Brooks baseball agrees.

"His four-seam fastball is thrown at a speed that’s borderline unfair, generates a very high amount of groundballs . . . (and) more whiffs/swing compared to other pitchers"

In fact, Alvarado throws everything extremely hard; maybe too hard. He favors a two-seam fastball 51.6% of the time, throwing it 97+ mph and leaving it too far up in the zone to be called a sinker. Hitters haven’t made him pay as yet due to the velocity and movement he generates. They managed 22 hits off the two-seamer including four double and a home run.

His curve sits about 84 with a lot of run and depth. If he leaves it over the plate it can become a fly ball but the four hits off his 156 hooks the pitch this year were singles.

Alvarado posted the best shutdown (.417) / meltdown (.066) averages and not because of sample size.

The young lefty earns league minimum and won’t be a free agent until 2024.

Halo and goodbye

Jose Alvarez didn’t make the original Atlanta Braves wish list, but as the Angels sank slowly in the west things changed. They now-now look like sellers so I regrouped and added him.

Alvarez joined the Angels in 2014 and appeared at least 60 times and thrown at least 48 innings every year since.

Unlike most relievers who rely on two main weapons, Alvarez uses a four-pitch arsenal. His four-seam fastball sits 92-93 with % WHIFF rate. His sinker arrives as fast as his four-seamer but with significantly more movement and an 11.6% WHIFF rate.

He backs those up with a solid 83 mph slider and a change that Brooks Baseball calls, a real worm killer that generates an extreme number of groundballs.

Alvarez lands in the middle of the pack on most my highly weighted metrics. He has two arbitration years remaining, with free agency possible in 2021.