Houston’s primary designated hitter Yordan Alvarez is coming off an impressive rookie campaign that saw him unanimously win the American League Rookie of the Year award despite appearing in just 87 games. Fantasy owners everywhere were eagerly awaiting the imminent call up of Alvarez for what felt like years. After hitting 23 home runs and slashing a ridiculous .343/.443/.742 at Triple-A before getting the call, Alvarez came up and brought his picturesque lefty stroke to Houston. In 87 games with the Astros, he swatted 27 home runs, drove in 78 runs and slashed a very respectable .313/.412/.655. Alvarez is an intriguing fantasy player this year, considering he has elite offensive potential, but his dearth of lineup flexibility could leave fantasy owners feeling pigeonholed.

On a statistical level, it was incredibly encouraging to see Alvarez avoid a significant drop off once being promoted to the big leagues. He hit at a high level, his walk rate remained similar, and his strikeout rate only jumped about 5-6 percent, which is fine. Sure, we’d like to see him get that 25.5 percent K-rate from last year down a bit, but nowadays, that’s practically commonplace for a slugger of his caliber.

Alvarez nearly broke Statcast once he got called up. He ranked in the 95th percentile in average exit velocity and hard hit rate, and the 98th percentile for xwOBA and xSLG, per Baseball Savant. The young slugger boasts a natural left-handed swing that would even make Roy Hobbs jealous, and he uses a bat that wasn’t struck by lightning to send balls flying over the outfield fences.

The most worrisome downfall I saw from the promotion was that once he got up to the big league, he relied less on the left side of the field. It dropped nearly 15 percent, and the combination of increased fly balls and softer contact to that side of the field isn’t the most encouraging. However, he showed the ability to use the left side of the field in the minors, and it’s something he should improve upon in 2020.

Additionally, as the season went on, pitchers learned that throwing fastballs to Alvarez simply wasn’t going to work. With pitchers getting tired of dealing with a sore neck from having to jerk their body around to watch the ball he just smashed fly over 400 feet, they began giving him a heavy dosage of breaking balls. From the image below, you will see that pitchers were onto something, considering that Alvarez’s barrel rate against non-fastballs steadily declined as the year went on.

Courtesy of Baseball Savant

Alvarez’s struggles in the postseason are well documented, but he made some adjustments once the World Series rolled around, and that should help alleviate some of the concerns heading into 2020. Can Alvarez get statistically better in 2020? In some regards, yes. However, I believe it’s going to be more so a continuation of last season, perhaps with a slight drop off in some categories. Give Alvarez 150 games this season, and the guy is going to hit 40 home runs, easy. It’s going to be incredibly hard to improve on his gaudy 1.067 OPS from last season, but a .900 OPS over 150 games is still pretty damn good. Compare it to Patrick Mahomes in football. Sure, he threw 50 touchdowns in 2018, and everyone expected some regression to about 40 touchdowns, which is STILL REALLY FREAKIN’ GOOD. Alvarez will be a valuable fantasy asset in 2019, by giving your team a steady batting average, probably in the .280 range with 40+ home runs and 100+ RBI.

Depending on your league settings, Alvarez may have played enough to log outfield eligibility. He did make 10 appearances last year, which may be enough, but again, you will want to consult your league settings for verification. Any additional positional eligibility helps for Alvarez, because as a potential 40+ home run guy, it’s fine coming from the utility spot, but having even just outfield eligibility attached to his name makes it far more valuable, considering that you’ll be able to put him in more than just one spot in your lineup.

At the time of writing, Alvarez is going off the board right at the end of the third round in 12-team formats, and that’s a lofty price to play for a guy who may only have utility eligibility in your league, but his power potential is unheralded and he couldn’t be in a better lineup. Don’t let his positional eligibility distract you from his fantasy potential in 2020.