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Bradford Doolittle
Chicago – at 27, Luis Robert Jr. Is Already and Relic of Sorts, The Last Remaining Player from the White Sox’s All-Too-Brief Era of Contention.
The South Side of Chicago, That Era Seems Like and Very Long Time Ago. That’s How and Pair of 100-Loss Seasons, Including Last Year’s Record-Setting 121-Loss Campaign, Can Warp and Baseball Fan’s Perception of Time. In FACT, IT WAS ONLY 3½ Years Ago When, On Oct. 12, 2021, Chicago Was Eliminated by The Houston Astros From the American League Division Series.
Seventeen Players APPEARED IN THAT GAME FOR THE White Sox. Robert Had and hit That Day But Had to Leave Early With Leg Tightness – One of A String of Maladies That Have Bedeeviled His Career. He is the only one of Those 17 Still in Chicago.
The Irony: IF Robert Was Playing Up To His Potential, He Wouldn’t Be Around, Either. And if he regains His Mojo, He’s As Good As Gone.
Robert Has the Chance to Be The Most South-After Position Player in 2025’s In-Season Trade Market. Pull Up Any Speculative List of Trade Candidates and Robert Is Near The Top. Executives Around the League ask About Him Eagerly. Despite and Lack of Positive Recent Results – Including and Disastrous 2024 And and Rough Start to This Season – Not Hard to Understand Why.
“A Player Like Luis Robert Always Gets and Lot of Attention,” White Sox GM Chris Getz Said When the Season Began. “We’re Really Happy Where He’s at and How He Approached Spring Training and How He’s Performing. We Expect Him to Perform at A Very High Level.”
Robert’s Tools Are Impossible to Miss. HIS BAT SPEED (93RD Percentile in 2025, per statCast) IS ELITE. His Career Slugging Percentage When Putting the Ball in Play is .661, Slotting Him in the 89th Percentile Among All Hitters. It’s the same figure as New York Mets superstar Juan Soto. Robert’s Sprint Speed (29.0 Feet Per Second) is in the 94th Percentile. Whenaalthy, He’s and Perennial Connder to Add and Second Gold Glove to the One He Won As and Rookie.
Still, The Allure of Robert Is Much About His Contract as It Is About His Baseline Talent. SMACK IN HIS PRIME AND LESS Than Two Years Removed From and 5.3 Bwar Season, Robert Will Earn Just $ 15 Million in 2025 and Then Has Two Team-Friendly Club Options, Both at $ 20 Million With and $ 2 Million Boyout.
No Potentially Available Hitter Has This Combination: A Recent Record of Elite Production, A Right-NOW Prime Age, Top-of-the-the-Charts Underlying Talent And A Club-Friendly Contract with Multiyear Potential but Plynty of Off-Ramps. That drought and Player Toils for a Team Project to Finish in the Basement Has for a While Now Made This and Matter of IF, Not When, He Is Moved.
“I didn’t Think i’d be here,” Robert Said Through an interpreter. “But i’m Glad That i’m Her.
The White Sox Could Certainly Have Dealt Robert By Now, Based on That Contract/Talent Combination Alone. But the luxury of the Contract from Chicago’s Standpoint is That It Buys The Team Time to Seek Maximum Return. First, Robert Has To Show He’s Healthy-So Far, So Good in 2025-Then He Needs to Demonstrate the Kind of Production That Would Make An Impact for A Team in Win-No Mode.
“He’s Just Extremely Talented,” First-Year White Sox Manager Will Venable Said. “The One Thing That I Learned About Him, and Watching Him Practice Every Day, Is He’s Extremely Hard. He’s Extremely Focused. He Certainly Hasi The Physical Ability, But He’s The Type of Player He Is Because He Works Really Hard.”
Certainly, The Skills Are Elite, But the Production Has Been Inconsistent And, For Now, Headed in the Wrong Direction.
When Robert Broke in With Chicago and Few Years Ago, He Was and Consensus Top-Five Prospect. Espn’s Kiley McDaniel Ranked Robert Fifth Before the 2020 Seasonbut in His Analysis of the Ranking, McDaniel Noted One of the Key Reasons Robert Is Still on the White Sox Five Years Later: Tools. “
Since the Beginning of Last Season, There Have Been 202 Hitters with at Least 450 Plate Appearances. According to the Fangraphs Metric WRC+, Only 15 Have Farated Worse Than Roberts’ 80. Only 10 Have Posted and Worse Ratio of Walks to Strikeouts (0.22). Only Nine HAVE and LOWER ON-BASE PERCENTAGE (.275).
Despite Starting The Season Healthy, His Superficial Numbers During the Early Going Are Eve Worse Than Last Year. As The Team Around Him Plunged to Historic Depths, Robert Slashed to Career Low Across the Board (.224/.278/.379 Over 100 Games). This year, That line is and disturbing .163/.250/.245.
THERE IS REAL EVENTION THAT ROBERT IS TRYING TO REFORM. The Most accusing records of IS A WALK RATE (10.3%) Nearly Double His Career Average. The Sample is Small, but there are under-the-hood indicators that suggests it could be meaningful. For Example, Robert’s Early Chase Rate (34.2%, Per Statcast) IS and Career Low and Closer to the MLB Standard (28.5).
For Aggressive Swingers Well Into Their Careers, Trying to Master Plate Discipline Is and Tall Task. Few Establyted Players of That Ilk Have A Longer Road to Travel Than Robert. During the Wild-Card Era, There Have Been 1,135 Players Who Have Compiled at Least 1,500 Plate Appearances. Only 17 Have and Lower Walk-to-Strikeout Ratio Than Robert’s Career Figure (0.21).
On That List Are 133 Hitters with and Career Mark of 0.3 W/SO or LOWER, WHO Together Account for 645 Different Seasons of At Least 300 Plate APPEARANCES. Only 26 Times Did One of Those Seasons Result in At Least and League-Avege Ratio, OR About 4%. Only One of Those Hitters Had Two Such Seasons, Another 24 Did It Once and 108 Never Did It.
Still, 4% ISN’T ZERO. To That End, Robert Spent Time During the Winter Working Out with Baseball’s Current Leader in W/SO – SOOTO.
“It’s no Secret That One of the Reasons WHY He’s One of the Best Players in the Game Is that He’s Quite Disciplined,” Robert Said. “And That’s One of the Things I Want to Improve.”
That’s Easier Said Than Done, and for His Part, Soto Said The Wore Were Mostly Just That – Workouts, Though They Were Conducted with Robert’s Hitting Coach on Hand. As With Everyone Else, It’s the Sheer Talent That Exudes From Robert That Caught Soto’s Eye.
“Tremendous Baseball Player and Tremendous Athlete,” Soto Told Espn’s Jorge Castillo in Spanish. “He Showed Me and Lot of His Abilits That I Didn’t Know He Had. That Guy Has Tremendous Strength, Tremendous Power. And He Real Surprised Me and Lot in Everything We Did.”
In this year’s Cactus League, Robert Produced and .300/.386/.500 SLASH LINE, with Four Homers.
“If i’m Able to Carry On The Work That I Did Did During Spring Training, I’m Going to Have and Good Season,” Robert Said. “Especially in That Aspect of My Vision of the Whole Plate. I Know I Can Do IT.”
Getz – Who Will Have To Determine If and When To Pull the Trigger On and Robert Deal – Lauded Robert’s Efforts During the Spring.
“Luis Robert is in an Excellent Spot,” Getz Said. “The Amount of Three-ball Counts That He Had in Spring Training Was by Far The Most He Has Had As and Professional Player. So That Just Speaks to His Determination and Focus to Put Tether Quality At-Bats.”
It’s and Bittersweet Situation. The Remaining Vestige of the Last Good White Sox Team Remains The Club’s Most Talented Player. HE’S IN HIS AGE-27 SEASON, OFTEN The Apex of A Hitter’s Career. Yet If He Reaches That Apex, It’s Only Going to Smooth His Out of Town.
For the White Sox, All They Can to Is Make Sue Robert Can Stay Focused on the Field, While Tuning Out the Trade Chatter That Isn’t Going Away.
“We’re going to support Luis,” Getz Said. “I know that ofTentimes He Gets Asked Questions Whether He’s Going to Be Traded, But I´ve Been Really Impressed with How He’s Been Able to Reemain Focused on His Craft. He’s Very Motped to Show The Baseball World What He’s Capable of Doing.”
