Jose Alvarado can spin a breaking ball

As the slog of a 162 game season takes its toll on players, you tend to see guys compensate in different ways. It might mean shortening their delivery, changing a release point, or changing their swing. Players get tired. Bodies change. Players adjust.

Jose Alvarado is one player who has tinkered with his mechanics, with a creeping change taking place over a few months.

Alvarado’s release point has undergone a re-haul, and it really shows in the horizontal plane from April to September. The dropping horizontal release point can either mean a left-handed pitcher is shifting to the third-base side of the mound, or that his arm is coming in higher over the top.

A look at the vertical release…