‘This guy, he’s different’: What it’s like to watch Yordan Alvarez up close
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Jeff PassanESPN
At the beginning of the Houston Astros‘ 2019 spring training, Michael Brantley couldn’t believe what he was witnessing. Brantley is regarded as one of the purest professional hitters of his generation, a left fielder whose bat control and swing decisions had convinced the team to lavish $16 million a year on him in free agency. That day a 22-year-old left fielder/designated hitter named Yordan Álvarez, who had split the previous season between AA and AAA, was putting on a show in batting practice. After one round of swings, Brantley pulled Álvarez aside.
“I asked him his name, I asked him what position he played and I asked him why they signed me,” Brantley said. “I didn’t understand.”
Even then, before Álvarez stormed into the big leagues in the middle of 2019 and won American League Rookie of the Year, before he made it a habit of looking unstoppable in postseason series, before he established himself as arguably the game’s best left-handed hitter and inarguably one of its finest bats period, Brantley knew. It took all of one BP session to recognize what New York Yankees pitchers went into this American League Championship Series understanding: Álvarez is the Astros’ answer to Aaron Judge — a supremely talented leviathan, the sort of player who can carry a team to a championship.
This season, he hit the ball harder on average than everyone but Judge and was the only player in his universe offensively. After winning ALCS MVP honors last season, Álvarez is primed for a repeat against the Yankees, ready to do what he didn’t in the last postseason matchup against New York, when he went 1 for 22 in the ALCS as a rookie.
The many feats of Yordan Álvarez that have already become the stuff of legend in Houston would strain credulity if the ubiquity of video and the ball-tracking systems installed in every major league stadium weren’t there to verify them — or if his teammates didn’t enjoy telling the stories so much.
Here’s second baseman Jose Altuve‘s entry: In his second major league at-bat, against then-Baltimore starter Dylan Bundy, Álvarez took a second-pitch changeup, low and on the outer half of the plate, and deposited it 413 feet away to the opposite field. On the bench, Astros players stirred. Álvarez had hit 23 home runs in AAA, but this established that he could do more than let his 6-foot-5, 225-pound frame propel balls over the fence.
“We asked him, ‘Changeup, to left-center?'” Altuve said. “You normally pull those when you’re a rookie. You just pull everything. And he said, ‘Yeah, I was looking at some video the night before, and the guy throws change away after a fastball inside.’ As a rookie — that was like, oh, God, that’s your first homer, and you’re already thinking like that? His approach is so good.”
On first base that day stood Trey Mancini, who Baltimore traded to Houston before the deadline this July. After Álvarez rounded the bases on his first homer, Mancini turned to then-Astros first-base coach Don Kelly and said: “Who is this guy?” Kelly’s response: “He’s gonna be a stud.”
“It’s just such an easy swing,” Mancini said. “It’s the same swing every time. He doesn’t lose his posture very often. He gets everything he has into it, but it’s simple at the same time. It’s a beautiful swing. I’m very jealous of it. I would love to have a swing like that.”
The Astros were certainly fond of the swing when they pulled off one of the great deadline moves of all-time — acquiring him from the Los Angeles Dodgers, in a deal for reliever Josh Fields just six weeks after Álvarez signed following his defection from Cuba. But Houston’s front office couldn’t have imagined Álvarez would be this: 25 years old, with a career line of .296/.384/.590. Even better are his numbers this season: .306/.406/.613 with 37 home runs and 97 RBIs in 135 games alongside a walk rate of 13.9% (seventh in the big leagues) and a strikeout rate that dipped below 20% for the first time this season.
“The most impressive thing about him is it doesn’t matter what part of the field,” Astros reliever Ryne Stanek said. “Doesn’t matter where you go. He has power from pole to pole — real power. Being as young as he is and as disciplined as he is, is the actually scary part of his game.
“I had never actually faced him until my first spring training here last year. And I faced him my very first live (batting practice) here. It was early in spring. Velo still building. So I was like, all right, well, I know he’s obviously really good. I don’t wanna throw a bad fastball to him and lose my face. I’ll throw him a bunch of splits …. Not realizing that he just absolutely murders changeups.
“Got him on the first one, foul ball. The second one was like, f— yeah, I’m gonna throw another one. Missile. That’s not normal. … I was like, oh, damn, this guy, he’s different.”
The Seattle Mariners were the most recent team to leave a series against Álvarez spooked. In Game 1 of their division series against the Astros, he pummeled a Robbie Ray fastball 438 feet for the first come-from-behind, walk-off postseason home run since Joe Carter won the 1993 World Series. On the next day, with Mariners starter Luis Castillo cruising, Álvarez tracked a 99-mph sinker that ran 19 inches — starting on the inside corner and moving outside the strike zone — and drove it into Minute Maid Park’s left-field Crawford Boxes for another homer.
Following the game, Stanek and Astros closer Ryan Pressly were in the training room watching the replay. Even after seeing Álvarez turn the impossible into reality for years, Pressly was still gobsmacked. How? How, on a pitch at that velocity, with that sort of movement, in that location, could he possibly homer? Stanek’s response: “Don’t ask questions. Just let it happen.”
“Sometimes you get around hitters who the scouting report is just try to get them to hit singles,” Astros general manager James Click said. “And I think he’s reaching that territory. I remember being on the other side of him in 2019 when we were coming in here with Tampa, trying to figure out how to pitch to him. And you just kind of threw your hands up in the air because there isn’t an obvious way to do it. Almost every hitter in the big leagues, there’s something — there’s a hole in, there’s a hole out, there’s a hole up, there’s a hole down, there’s a hole soft, there’s a hole hard, there’s a hole lefty, there’s a hole righty. And he just doesn’t have ’em.”
Oakland pitcher Adrián Martinez learned that on Sept. 16. In his first at-bat, Alvarez hit a 95.1-mph sinker 434 feet out to center field. Next time around, Martínez opted for a changeup — which Álvarez walloped 431 feet out to center again. The third time up, Martínez went back to the fastball.
“And the first pitch, he hits it out to some poor guys trying to have a nice dinner in center field, 460 feet away, never thinking that a baseball was gonna hit them,” Click said. “It landed on their table. It was in that center-field restaurant out there. They showed the video of these guys out there, sitting around one of those silver high-top tables and realizing that a baseball was coming for them that had absolutely no business that far away from home plate.”
Álvarez came up to the plate once more in the seventh inning.
“The fourth at-bat, he hit a single and everyone was mad,” Astros third baseman Alex Bregman said. “And he hit that one 120 [mph].”
It was actually 109.3 mph, but forgive Bregman for the exaggeration. Already that day Álvarez had hit balls at 110.5 in the first inning, 108.7 in the third and 114.9 in the fifth. He does these sorts of things regularly enough that a 120-mph single isn’t out of the question (his record this year is 117.4 mph, off Chicago White Sox starter Lucas Giolito on June 17).
Some stories about Álvarez verge on apocryphal. Astros center fielder Jake Meyers said he heard that Álvarez had hit a ball over a net far beyond the outfield fence on a back field at the Astros’ spring-training complex. He estimated the distance somewhere between 475 and 500 feet. Bench coach Joe Espada confirmed Álvarez’s spring exploits, suggesting he regularly hits batting-practice pitches at least 480 feet. He’s gone opposite field into a lake on the property and hit balls all the way out of the complex itself, onto the streets that adjoin the facility.
And if that weren’t enough, Bregman said, Álvarez has “great baseball knowledge. Good feel for the game. Good instincts. And he’s got all the tools. He can play defense. He can throw. It’s accurate, too. I don’t know what the numbers and metrics say, but I think this year he’s been above-average.”
By some metrics, yes, Álvarez was a plus outfielder this year — a surprise this year, after he had played 174 games at DH compared to 51 in left field entering this season. Particularly impressive is his arm, which FanGraphs’ defensive metrics rank third among all major league outfielders in 2022.
Of course, the Astros didn’t give Álvarez a six-year, $115 million contract extension in June because of his throwing ability. He’s the present and future of the organization because he can hit like few others, because his swing is more holy than holey, because for all the feats Yordan Álvarez has reached in such a short time, there are plenty more to come.
“I just see a professional hitter who has a great understanding of what he wants to do in the box and goes out there and executes on a very high level,” Brantley said. “How he carries himself, you would think he has 10-plus years in the big leagues. He has a beautiful swing, and all the physical tools, but at the same time some mental aspects and approach that he carries up to the plate give him a great understanding of what he wants to do.
“It’s very impressive how he thinks and how he goes about his business, and it’s been an honor to watch him hit.”
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Bradford Doolittle
The initial 2025 MLB All-Star Game rosters are out, the product of the collaborative process between fans, players and the league. How did this annual confab do?
We already know that injuries will prevent some of these selectees from appearing in Atlanta, and replacement choices will be announced in the coming days. By the end of this post-selection period, we’ll wind up with something like 70 to 75 All-Stars for this season.
These first-draft rosters contain 65 players, the odd number stemming from the decision to send Clayton Kershaw to the festivities as a “Legend” pick. First reaction: Baseball’s newest member of the 3,000 strikeout club has earned everything he gets.
Now, on to the nitpicking.
American League
Biggest oversight: Joe Ryan, Minnesota Twins
The Twins’ lone representative on the initial rosters is outfielder Byron Buxton, a worthy selection. Ryan (8-4, 2.76 ERA) fell into a group of similar performers including Kansas City’s Kris Bubic and the Texas duo of Jacob deGrom and Nathan Eovaldi. Bubic and deGrom made it, which is great, and Bubic in particular is quite a story.
But Ryan and Eovaldi didn’t make it, and both were probably a little more deserving that Seattle’s Bryan Woo, whose superficial numbers (8-4, 2.77) are very close to Ryan’s. But Woo plays in a more friendly pitching park, and the under-the-hood metrics favor Ryan.
The main takeaway: If this is the biggest discrepancy, the process worked well.
Second-biggest oversight: Many-way tie between several hitters
The every-team-gets-a-player rule, along with positional requirements, always knocks out worthy performers from teams with multiple candidates. Thus, a few picks on the position side might have gone differently.
The Rays are playing so well they probably deserve more than one player. Their most deserving pick made it — infielder Jonathan Aranda — along with veteran second baseman Brandon Lowe. Infielders such as J.P. Crawford (Seattle), Isaac Paredes (Houston) and Zach McKinstry (Detroit) had good cases to make it ahead of Lowe, whose power numbers (19 homers, 54 RBIs) swayed the players.
While acknowledging that Gunnar Henderson has had a disappointing season, I still think he deserved to be the Orioles’ default pick instead of Ryan O’Hearn. But the latter was selected as the AL’s starting DH by the fans, and Baltimore doesn’t deserve two players. It’s a great story that O’Hearn will be a first-time All-Star just a couple of weeks before his 32nd birthday.
Other thoughts
• The default White Sox selection is rookie starter Shane Smith, a Rule 5 pick from Milwaukee last winter. Smith is my lowest-rated player on the AL squad, but he has been consistently solid. Adrian Houser, an in-season pickup, has been great for Chicago and has arguably produced more value than Smith. But I like honoring the rookie who has been there the whole campaign.
• The Athletics’ Jacob Wilson was elected as a starter and is easily the most deserving player from that squad. I’m not sure I see a second pick there, but Brent Rooker made it as a DH. Rooker has been fine, but his spot could have gone to one of the overlooked hitters already mentioned, or perhaps Kansas City’s Maikel Garcia.
• Houston’s Jeremy Pena is a deserving choice and arguably should be the AL’s starter at shortstop instead of Wilson. Alas, he’s on the injured list, and though reports say he might soon resume baseball activities, it’s likely Pena will be replaced. Any of the above-mentioned overlooked hitters will do.
• As for the starters, the fans do a great job nowadays. I disagreed with them on a couple of spots, though. I would have gone with a keystone combo of Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Pena rather than Gleyber Torres and Wilson, but I’d have them all on the team. And I would have definitely started Buxton over Javier Baez in the outfield.
National League
Biggest oversight: Juan Soto, New York Mets
Not sure how this happens, but I’m guessing Soto is a victim of his own standards. Yes, he signed a contract for an unfathomable amount of money, and so far, he hasn’t reinvented the game as a member of the Mets. He has just been lower-end Juan Soto, which is still one of the best players in the sport. His OBP is, as ever, north of .400, he leads the league in walks and it sure seems as if Pete Alonso has very much enjoyed hitting behind him.
The All-Star Game was invented for players like Soto, and though you might leave out someone like him if he is having a truly poor season, that’s not the case here. It is kind of amazing that he didn’t make it, while MacKenzie Gore and James Wood — both part of the trade that sent Soto from Washington to San Diego — did. They deserve it, and you can make a strong argument that a third player the Nats picked up in the trade — CJ Abrams — does as well. But Soto deserves it too.
Finally, the Marlins’ most-deserving pick is outfielder Kyle Stowers, who indeed ended up as their default selection. But he probably ended up with Soto’s slot.
Second-biggest oversight: Andy Pages, Los Angeles Dodgers
It’s hard to overlook anyone on the Dodgers, but somehow Pages slipped through the cracks despite his fantastic all-around first half for the defending champs.
It was just a numbers game. I’ve got five NL outfielders rated ahead of Pages, and all but Soto made it, so no additional quibbles there. The fans voted in Ronald Acuna Jr. to start at his home ballpark. Having Acuna there in front of the fans in Atlanta makes sense. But he has played only half of the first half.
Other thoughts
• The shortstop position is loaded in the NL, but the only pure shortstops to make it were starter Francisco Lindor and Elly De La Cruz. Both are good selections, but the Phillies’ Trea Turner has been just as outstanding. Abrams and Arizona’s Geraldo Perdomo are also deserving. The position has been so good that the player with the most career value currently playing shortstop in the NL — Mookie Betts — barely merits a mention. Betts has had a subpar half, but who will be surprised if he’s topping this list by the end of the season?
• Both leagues had three pitching staff slots given to relievers. The group in the AL (Aroldis Chapman, Josh Hader and Andres Munoz) was much more clear-cut than the one in the NL, which ended up with the Giants’ Randy Rodriguez, the Mets’ Edwin Diaz and the Padres’ Jason Adam. It made sense to honor someone from San Diego’s dominant bullpen, and you could have flipped a coin to pick between Adam and Adrian Morejon.
• Picking these rosters while meeting all the requirements and needs for teams and positions is hard. I don’t have any real issue with the pitchers selected for the NL. One of them is Atlanta’s Chris Sale, who is on the IL and will have to be replaced. My pick would be Philadelphia’s Cristopher Sanchez (7-2, 2.68 ERA).
• And for the starting position players, Alonso should have gotten the nod over Freddie Freeman at first base, though it will be great to see Freeman’s reception when he takes the field in Atlanta. For that matter, the Cubs’ Michael Busch has had a better first half than Freeman at this point, though that became true only in the past few days, thanks to his explosion at Wrigley Field. I would have gone with Turner at short, but it’s close. And I’d have started Wood in place of Acuna.
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Jesse Rogers
The last-place Washington Nationals fired president of baseball operations Mike Rizzo and manager Davey Martinez, the team announced Sunday.
Rizzo, 64, and Martinez, 60, won a World Series with the Nationals in 2019, but the team has floundered in recent years. This season, the Nationals are 37-53 and stuck at the bottom of the National League East after getting swept by the Boston Red Sox this weekend at home. Washington hasn’t finished higher than fourth in the division since winning the World Series.
“On behalf of our family and the Washington Nationals organization, I first and foremost want to thank Mike and Davey for their contributions to our franchise and our city,” principal owner Mark Lerner said in a statement. “Our family is eternally grateful for their years of dedication to the organization, including their roles in bringing a World Series trophy to Washington, D.C.
“While we are appreciative of their past successes, the on-field performance has not been where we or our fans expect it to be. This is a pivotal time for our club, and we believe a fresh approach and new energy is the best course of action for our team moving forward.”
Mike DeBartolo, the club’s senior vice president and assistant general manager, was named interim GM on Sunday night. DeBartolo will oversee all aspects of baseball operations, including the MLB draft. An announcement will be made on the interim manager Monday, a day before the club begins a series against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Rizzo has been the top decision-maker in Washington since 2013, and Martinez has been on board since 2018. Under Rizzo’s leadership, the team made the postseason four times: in 2014, 2016, 2017 and 2019. The latter season was Martinez’s lone playoff appearance.
“When our family assumed control of the team, nearly 20 years ago, Mike was the first hire we made,” Lerner said. “Over two decades, he was with us as we went from a fledging team in a new city to World Series champion. Mike helped make us who we are as an organization, and we’re so thankful to him for his hard work and dedication — not just on the field and in the front office, but in the community as well.”
The Nationals are in the midst of a rebuild that has moved slower than expected, though the team didn’t augment its young core much during the winter. Led by All-Stars James Wood and MacKenzie Gore, Washington has the second-youngest group of hitters in MLB and the sixth-youngest pitching staff.
The team lost 11 straight games in a forgettable stretch last month. And during a 2-10 run in June, Washington averaged just 2.5 runs. Since June 1, the Nationals have scored one run or been shut out seven times. In Sunday’s 6-4 loss to Boston, they left 15 runners on base.
There was industry speculation over the winter that the Nationals would spend money on free agents for the first time in several years, but that never materialized. Instead, the team made minor moves, signing free agents Josh Bell and Michael Soroka, trading for first baseman Nathaniel Lowe and re-signing closer Kyle Finnegan. Now, the hope is a new management team, both on and off the field, can help change the franchise’s fortunes.
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David Schoenfield
The rosters for the 2025 MLB All-Star Game will feature 19 first-timers — and one legend — as the pitchers and reserves were announced Sunday for the July 15 contest at Truist Park in Atlanta.
Los Angeles Dodgers left-hander Clayton Kershaw, a three-time Cy Young Award winner who made his first All-Star team in 2011, was named to his 11th National League roster as a special commissioner’s selection.
Kershaw, who became only the fourth left-hander to amass 3,000 career strikeouts, is 4-0 with a 3.43 ERA in nine starts after beginning the season on the injured list. He joins Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrera as a legend choice, after the pair of sluggers were selected in 2022.
Kershaw said he didn’t want to discuss the selection Sunday.
Among the first-time All-Stars announced Sunday: Dodgers teammate Yoshinobu Yamamoto; Washington Nationals outfielder James Wood and left-hander MacKenzie Gore; Houston Astros ace Hunter Brown and shortstop Jeremy Pena; and Chicago Cubs 34-year-old left-hander Matthew Boyd.
“It’ll just be cool being around some of the best players in the game,” Wood said.
First-time All-Stars previously elected to start by the fans include Seattle Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh, Athletics shortstop Jacob Wilson, Baltimore Orioles designated hitter Ryan O’Hearn and Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong.
Overall, the 19 first-time All-Stars is a drop from the 32 first-time selections on the initial rosters in 2024.
Kershaw would be the sentimental choice to start for the National League, although Pittsburgh Pirates ace Paul Skenes, who leads NL pitchers in ERA and WAR, might be in line to start his second straight contest. Philadelphia Phillies right-hander Zack Wheeler, a three-time All-Star, is 9-3 with a 2.17 ERA after Sunday’s complete-game victory and also would be a strong candidate to start.
“I think it would be stupid to say no to that. It’s a pretty cool opportunity,” Skenes said about the possibility of being asked to start by Dodgers manager Dave Roberts. “I didn’t make plans over the All-Star break or anything. So, yeah, I’m super stoked.”
Kershaw has made one All-Star start in his career, in 2022 at Dodger Stadium.
Among standout players not selected were New York Mets outfielder Juan Soto, who signed a $765 million contract as a free agent in the offseason, and Dodgers shortstop Mookie Betts, who had made eight consecutive All-Star rosters since 2016.
Soto got off to a slow start but was the National League Player of the Month in June and entered Sunday ranked sixth in the NL in WAR among position players while ranking second in OBP, eighth in OPS and third in runs scored.
The players vote for the reserves at each position and selected Wood, Corbin Carroll of the Arizona Diamondbacks and Fernando Tatis Jr. of the San Diego Padres as the backup outfielders. Kyle Stowers also made it as a backup outfielder as the representative for the Miami Marlins.
Unless Soto later is added as an injury replacement, he’ll miss his first All-Star Game since his first full season in 2019.
The Dodgers lead all teams with five representatives: Kershaw, Yamamoto and starters Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman and Will Smith. The AL-leading Detroit Tigers (57-34) and Mariners have four each.
Tigers ace Tarik Skubal will join AL starters Riley Greene, Gleyber Torres and Javier Baez, while Raleigh, the AL’s starting catcher, will be joined by Seattle teammates Bryan Woo, Andres Munoz and Julio Rodriguez.
Earning his fifth career selection but first since 2021 is Texas Rangers righty Jacob deGrom, who is finally healthy after making only nine starts in his first two seasons with the Rangers and is 9-2 with a 2.13 ERA. He has never started an All-Star Game, although Skubal or Brown would be the favorite to start for the AL.
The hometown Braves will have three All-Stars in Acuna, pitcher Chris Sale (his ninth selection, tied with Freeman for the second most behind Kershaw) and first baseman Matt Olson. The San Francisco Giants had three pitchers selected: Logan Webb, Robbie Ray and reliever Randy Rodriguez.
The slumping New York Yankees ended up with three All-Stars: Aaron Judge, Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Max Fried. The Mets also earned three All-Star selections: Francisco Lindor, Pete Alonso and Edwin Diaz.
“Red carpet, that’s my thing,” Chisholm said. “I do have a ‘fit in mind.”
Rosters are expanded from 26 to 32 for the All-Star Game. They include starters elected by fans, 17 players (five starting pitchers, three relievers and a backup for each position) chosen in a player vote and six players (four pitchers and two position players) selected by league officials. Every club must be represented.
Acuna, Wood and Raleigh are the three All-Stars who have so far committed to participating in the Home Run Derby.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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