The Blue Jays announced that they have traded right-hander Nick Robertson, who was designated for assignment last week, to the Astros. In exchange, minor league righty Edinson Batista heads to the Jays. To open a 40-man spot for Robertson, the Astros transferred Cristian Javier to the 60-day injured list, per Chandler Rome of The Athletic. Rome adds that Robertson will report to Triple-A Sugar Land.
Robertson, 26, has a fairly limited major league track record. Over the past two years, he has thrown 35 2/3 innings for the Dodgers, Red Sox, Cardinals and Blue Jays. He has a 5.30 earned run average in that sample but his 24.8% strikeout rate and 6.8% walk rate are both a bit better than average, while his 42.2% ground ball rate is right around par.
His minor league work wasn’t great last year but was quite strong before that. From 2021 to 2023, he tossed 168 1/3 innings on the farm with a 3.80 ERA, 29.1% strikeout rate and 8.4% walk rate. But last year, he posted a 6.87 ERA, 21.7% strikeout rate and 13.7% walk rate in 36 2/3 Triple-A innings.
His profile has been enough to garner interest from several clubs. He was flipped from Los Angeles to Boston in the July 2023 trade that sent Enrique Hernández to the Dodgers, then the Sox sent him to the Cards in the December 2023 deal that sent Tyler O’Neill to Fenway. St. Louis put him on waivers in September, with the Jays putting in a claim and holding him through the offseason. But they needed to open some 40-man spots as they set their Opening Day roster and bumped Robertson off.
Robertson still has an option season remaining, so the Astros can keep him in Sugar Land to see if he can put 2024 behind him. They had some 40-man roster spots to burn due to several injuries. Javier had Tommy John surgery in June of last year and won’t be an option until the second half of the season even in a best-case scenario.
Presumably, several clubs were interested in adding Robertson as some optionable depth, so the Astros had to part with a minor leaguer in order to jump the waiver queue. Batista, 23 in May, was an international signing out of the Dominican Republic. He hasn’t yet risen higher than the High-A level, showing some ability to get strikeouts and ground balls but also with control issues. Since the start of 2021, he has 277 1/3 innings pitched across various minor league levels with a 4.87 ERA, 23.9% strikeout rate and 11.4% walk rate. He has worked both out of the rotation and the bullpen.
In June of 2024, Eric Longenhagen and Travis Ice of FanGraphs gave Batista an honorable mention on their list of the top prospects in the Astros’ system, describing him as “an advanced, athletic, undersized depth starter type.”
Photo courtesy of Jonathan Dyer, Imagn Images
Edinson has a bad home run and walk problem, hopefully the jays can do something to fix that.
Though he cut his HR/9 exactly in half last year compared to 2023.
@alex
Yeah, which is interesting.
Im pretty sure my Astros are not using the new torpedo bats. I think we have 1 double and 1 hr in 4 games. Smh
Certainly worth a try
They have faced pretty good pitching so far. Not like Cubs vs A’s.
Who’s going to be the new left winger?
This could potentially be a 2-3 WAR swing for Batista’s replacement-level ceiling all while the league sleeps on a 26-year-old with a live arm.