Pedro

Alvarez

Alvarez opted out of his minor league contract with the Marlins after he failed to make the Opening Day roster in spite of a strong spring. He’s now 32 and has had limited reps in the majors over the last two seasons.

Alvarez was signed to a minor league deal with an invite to spring training, but was a long shot to make the roster because of the lack of designated hitter in the National League, and his lack of being good at defense. He will explore options, but he may find the pickings slim despite his power.

Alvarez faced lefty Tyler Webb in the eighth inning and won the matchup, lifting a long fly ball to right field for the two-run blast. It was his third homer of the spring, and the 32-year-old is hitting .345 with a 1.136 OPS in 29 at-bats. He somewhat surprisingly seems like a good bet to break camp with the Marlins at this point.

Alvarez had a pretty eventful day for someone who entered the game as a pinch-runner in the fifth inning. After coming around to score there, he crushed a three-run homer off of Seth Lugo in his first at-bat, giving the Marlins a 9-6 lead. He added to that advantage when he clobbered a two-run shot off of Tim Peterson in the eighth. Alvarez is now hitting .321 (9-for-28) with a pair of homers and eight RBI on the spring. With only Neil Walker and Peter O’Brien ahead of him on the depth chart at first base, he could find his way onto the Opening Day roster if he can keep this up.

Alvarez is 7-for-26 with a couple of doubles, which probably isn’t going to be good enough to force the Marlins to carry him on Opening Day. He might well be the best first base option on the roster, at least against righties, but given that he’s a 32-year-old with obvious defensive limitations, there isn’t a ton of incentive for putting him on the roster.

Alvarez, a former All-Star, has appeared in just 59 games in the majors over the past two seasons while batting .210/.298/.420 with nine homers in 161 plate appearances. He stick packs some pop against right-handed pitching, but doesn’t really have a position and makes for a poor fit on National League rosters.

Alvarez has spent most of the last two seasons in the minors. He’ll have to settle for another minor league pact this winter.

Harrison is out-hitting Alvarez, but the Bucs want to keep both youngsters involved as they begin making roster plans for 2012. It’s a situation to avoid in fantasy leagues.

Alvarez is 6-for-21 with three homers after opening the season 1-for-24. He’s also striking out less, though that’s in part because he couldn’t possibly strike out more. The homers are still pretty much all he has going for him, but at least things don’t seem as bleak as they did a week ago.

Alvarez is playing his way back to Triple-A. He’s now 4-for-30 with 13 strikeouts this spring. Unless he turns it around quick, it seems likely that the Pirates will go with Casey McGehee at third base. It will be interesting to see if they then choose to keep Matt Hague as a backup at the corner infield spots.