Jose Alvarado

Alvarado opened the season sharing closing duties with Diego Castillo. He was effective early, posting a 1.04 ERA and 0.92 WHIP, fanning 26 in 17.1 innings, with five holds and a perfect 4-for-4 saves mark. Things then unraveled for Alvarado, as he allowed seven earned runs over his next seven frames, walking eight while surrendering 11 hits. Alvarado then left the country to attend to a personal matter in Venezuela, returning to the club in late June. His season was interrupted twice more, the first with a sore oblique followed by elbow inflammation prematurely ending his season in August. After his dominant start to the season, Alvarado never regained form. With a revamped bullpen featuring Emilio Pagan and Nick Anderson, Alvarado will first need to show he's healthy, then pitch well enough to return to late-inning duties.

Closers need a couple things: two quality pitches (or one amazing one) and command. Alvarado has two excellent pitches in a fastball that tickles triple digits and a hard, 11-5 breaking ball that batters have a tough time picking up out of his hand. Early in 2018, he lacked the command portion of that equation and had a 14% K-BB rate despite his stuff because he could not hit his spots consistently. That changed midseason and Alvarado had a 28 K-BB% in the second half while holding hitters to a .154 batting average and a .244 slugging percentage. He allowed one home run on the season to the 263 batters he faced, which while fortunate, also speaks to how tough he is for batters to pick up. A few year ago, the club had Felipe Vazquez on the roster and traded him to get Jose Lobaton. They have Vazquez 2.0 here and will not repeat that mistake. As long as the Rays do not try to game the arbitration system, this is their new closer.

Alvarado's fastball-slider combo had enticed during his rise through the farm system, but he hadn't shown an ability to locate with consistency prior to 2017. The lefty issued walks at a 6.4 BB/9 clip in a 16-game stint at Triple-A and hadn't posted a mark under 4.0 at any level. All of a sudden, Alvarado began hitting his spots and ended up with an above-average walk rate (2.7 BB/9) in his first exposure to big-league hitters. The swing-and-miss came with him to the majors, with Alvarado averaging close to a strikeout per inning, and he induced groundballs 53.7 percent of the time. His FIP was more than a run lower than his ERA at 2.55 -- that was good for 18th among 291 relievers with at least 20 innings. Alvarado was excellent against righties (.193 wOBA), and if Alex Colome is dealt this winter, Alvarado could get a look in the ninth.