3 reasons Alonso can be a 40-homer hitter again

Pete Alonso, the biggest bat still on the free-agent market, remains a bit of a conundrum.

He's been one of MLB's top power hitters for his whole career, of course -- Alonso's 226 home runs since he debuted in 2019, an average of 43 per 162 games, rank second only to Aaron Judge.

But he's also coming off a down year by his own slugging standards -- Alonso went from hitting 46 homers in 2023 to 34 in 2024, a 12-home run dropoff and his career low for a full season. His slugging percentage fell from .504 to .459, also a career low.

Alonso has reportedly given the Mets an exclusive opportunity for a reunion. But should the Mets jump at that chance to keep Polar Bear Pete at Citi Field? Or will the 30-year-old have to test the waters with a new team that banks on his ability to keep hitting homers at an elite level?

The first step is to find out where Alonso's missing home runs went last season. Then we can see if we should expect him to be 40-homer Alonso again.

Let's break it down. Here are three reasons for Alonso's power dip in 2024 -- and three reasons why he can get that power back in 2025 and beyond.

Why Alonso's home runs decreased …

1) He wasn't slugging breaking balls like he usually does

Alonso, historically, has hammered breaking pitches. Not for average, necessarily, but for power.

And that's what's important for a big home run hitter like him. You can strike out Alonso with a nasty slider or curveball, but you'd better not miss your spot, or he's going to put it in the seats.

Well, at least until 2024. It was the first full season of Alonso's career where he didn't hit double-digit home runs against breaking balls, and his slugging percentage against them was by far a career low.

Alonso's HR and SLG vs. breaking pitches by season
Excluding shortened 2020 season

• 2019: 10 HR, .425 SLG
• 2021: 17 HR, .540 SLG
• 2022: 14 HR, .520 SLG
• 2023: 14 HR, .491 SLG
• *2024: 6 HR, .294 SLG*

That's a difference of eight home runs, and nearly 200 points of slugging. Alonso's ability to do damage against breaking balls is a big part of what makes him such a dangerous hitter. It's an important dimension of his game that went missing last season, and he'll need to find in 2025. Pitchers need to be afraid to throw Alonso a bad slider.

2) He stopped crushing low pitches

One of the signature traits Alonso has developed over his career is that he's a low-ball home run hitter.

He's the MLB leader in home runs off low pitches -- those in the lower third of the strike zone or below -- since his debut. Alonso has gone deep 83 times against low pitches, ahead of Matt Olson (82), Yordan Alvarez (73) and Freddie Freeman (71) for the most low-ball homers since 2019.

But his numbers dropped off last season. Entering 2024, Alonso had hit at least 15 home runs off low pitches in every full season of his career. In 2024, he only hit eight homers off low pitches, barely half his previous career worst.

Alonso's HR vs. low pitches by season
Excluding shortened 2020 season

• 2019: 22 (50% of his HR)
• 2021: 15 (42% of his HR)
• 2022: 20 (41% of his HR)
• 2023: 15 (33% of his HR)
• *2024: 8 (24% of his HR)*

Alonso's power dropoff vs. low pitches is somewhat linked to his power dropoff vs. breaking pitches -- breaking balls are more likely to be down in the zone, so there's overlap between those two categories. But he was also great at taking low fastballs and offspeed pitches deep in seasons past. Alonso not crushing low-ball homers is a clue that something's been off.

3) His hard contact didn't go as far

Alonso still rips the ball. His 46% hard-hit rate ranked in the 80th percentile of MLB, and was actually slightly higher than his career hard-hit rate of 44%.

But he didn't get as much production out of his hard contact as he usually does. Why? Because fewer of those hard-hit balls were in the air, and more were on the ground. Compare Alonso in 2023 to Alonso in 2024.

% of Alonso's hard-hit balls that were line drives or fly balls

• 2023: 72% (career high)
• 2024: 61% (career low)

Average batted ball distance of Alonso's hard contact

• 2023: 253 feet (career high)
• 2024: 220 feet (career low)

Alonso's SLG on hard contact

• 2023: 1.467
• 2024: 1.172 (close to 300-point dropoff)

Alonso just needs to get some of those hard-hit balls back in the air in 2025, where they can turn into extra home runs.

Why Alonso can still be a 40-home run hitter …

1) He has top-tier bat speed

Alonso's power dip wasn't a bat speed problem. He has one of the fastest bats in the Major Leagues, and the higher swing speeds you can generate, the harder and farther you can drive the baseball.

Alonso's average bat speed in 2024 was 75.3 mph, ranking in the 93rd percentile of MLB hitters.

The threshold for an individual swing to qualify as a "fast swing" is 75 mph. Alonso's average swing was over that mark. He was one of 25 qualifying hitters to average a 75-plus mph bat speed last season.

Alonso was also one of 19 hitters with at least 150 "blasts" -- swings where the hitter has a high bat speed and squares the ball up on the sweet spot of the bat. Blasts are the type of swings that do damage; Alonso had 153 of them. That bodes well for him.

So it's not like pitchers are blowing the ball by Alonso. He has all the bat speed he needs to remain an elite power hitter.

2) He barrels the ball as consistently as anyone

Statcast measures the exit velocity and launch angle of every ball a hitter hits, and the very best ones are classified as barrels. Those are batted balls hit with both an ideal exit velocity and an ideal launch angle. Barrels are what turn into home runs, or at least extra-base hits.

Alonso has posted elite barrel totals every year since he's come into the Major Leagues. And that didn't change in 2024.

Alonso's 58 barreled balls ranked just outside the top 10 in the Majors. He was one of 30 hitters with at least 50 barrels … and Alonso has now reached that mark in every full season of his career.

Only three hitters have at least 50 barrels in every full season since 2019: Alonso, Juan Soto and Matt Olson. And Alonso is actually the only one with at least 55 barrels in all five of those seasons (the 60-game 2020 season excluded).

Most 50+ barrel seasons since 2019

• 5 -- Pete Alonso, Juan Soto, Matt Olson
• 4 -- Shohei Ohtani, Aaron Judge, Freddie Freeman, Yordan Alvarez, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Rafael Devers, Kyle Schwarber, Teoscar Hernández, Eugenio Suárez

All told, Alonso's 329 career barrels rank fourth in the Majors since 2019, behind only Judge (403), Ohtani (368) and Soto (331). Barrels translate to home runs, so Alonso's elite consistency there is a good sign moving forward.

3) His postseason was a bright spot

Alonso helped power the Mets on their run to the National League Championship Series with some big playoff home runs.

And the way he hit those home runs was encouraging.

Of course there was the incredible go-ahead home run off Devin Williams' "airbender" changeup that saved the Mets' season in the Wild Card round -- that was off one of the best closers, and nastiest pitches, in all of baseball. Alonso is still a threat to homer off anyone and anything.

But you can also look at the home runs he hit against the Phillies in Game 2 of the NLDS and the Dodgers in Game 5 of the NLCS -- those were both off breaking pitches, the ones he struggled to hit out of the park during the regular season.

That last one was a 113.6 mph, 432-foot blast to dead center against a Jack Flaherty slider down below the strike zone. It was the type of vintage Alonso low-ball home run swing you weren't seeing as much during the year.

And Alonso's bat speed in the postseason was 75.9 mph, above his regular season average and in the top 10 among postseason hitters.

So if Alonso can carry a little bit of that playoff momentum with him, whether it's with the Mets or a new team, there are more 40-homer seasons in his future.