Marlins pitcher Henderson Alvarez has been on a nice run recently, but he has limited upside.
Alvarez has seen improvement in his strikeout rate, but he still has a long way to go. Alvarez is striking out 12.9 percent of batters, which is a big upgrade over his 9.8 percent from 2012. Overall, however, it's still pretty bad compared to the average NL pitcher. National League pitchers have averaged a strikeout rate of 19.7 percent this year, according to FanGraphs.com.
The other issue is that Alvarez has yet to allow a home run. Last season, Alvarez gave up his fair share of dingers, but has been great in his seven starts this year. While some of that is due to his move to the Marlins park, he will obviously start giving up homers. He may not be as homer-prone as he was last year, but it doesn't seem likely he'll continue to severely depress that number.
In seven starts, Alvarez has a 2.80 ERA.