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Luis Robert

White Sox To Place Luis Robert On IL

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The White Sox are placing center fielder Luis Robert on the injured list with flu-like symptoms, general manager Rick Hahn told James Fegan of The Athletic and other reporters. Robert will undergo further testing to determine how much time he’ll miss. The team is recalling right-hander Alex McRae to take Robert’s roster spot.

Robert burst on the scene in 2020 as an American League Rookie of the Year candidate and a Gold Glove winner, and he got off to a nice start this season before this illness cropped up. The 23-year-old has slashed .305/.356/.463 with a home run and four steals in 90 plate appearances, and has cut his strikeout rate by almost 7 percent since last season.

Robert will be a difficult player for the White Sox to go without, considering he has started all 21 of their games in center this year. The White Sox will start Leury Garcia there on Tuesday against the Tigers, and they also recalled Luis Gonzalez for depth purposes.

Gold Glove Nominees Announced

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The 2020 Rawlings Glove Glove Award finalists have been released, with the Cubs netting the most nominations with seven. The Mets, Nationals, Phillies, Brewers, Rays, and Red Sox were shut out.

The awards for defensive prowess will be handed out based on defensive metrics alone this year, since managers and coaches weren’t able to see players outside their regional bubble. Moving to a metrics-based system, even for a year, certainly make for interesting television, especially since these awards can make an impact on arbitration cases. Considering the uncertainty of a 60-game season, awards could carry greater weight than usual in those proceedings, thought that’s just speculation. Without further ado, here are this year’s nominees:

AL Pitcher

NL Pitcher

AL Catcher

NL Catcher

AL First Base

NL First Base

AL Second Base

NL Second Base

AL Third Base

NL Third Base

AL Shortstop

NL Shortstop

AL Left Field

NL Left Field

AL Centerfield

NL Centerfield

AL Right Field

NL Right Field

Nicky Lopez of the Royals was originally left off the list, but he is in fact a nominee at second base, one of four nominations at the keystone in the American League. It’s the only position with four nominations.

There are a few other interesting things of note. Perennial candidates like Andrelton Simmons and Matt Chapman did not make the list this year due to shortened seasons, nor did last season’s Outs Above Average leader Victor Robles. Both Gurriel brothers earned nominations this year, with the younger Lourdes (LF) joining perennial candidate Yuli (1B).

There are also a couple of largely part-time players that made the cut, like Hoerner of the Cubs and Mendick for the White Sox. Neither was the everyday second baseman, but they did reach the inning minimum of 265 total defensive innings. They qualified at second because that’s where they played the most innings. Mendick, for example, registered just 226 innings at second, but with 27 innings at third and 15 at shortstop, he ended the year with 268 total defensive innings played.

Catchers required a minimum of 29 games, which is how we got a pair of White Sox catchers making the top-3. Pitchers had to throw a minimum of 50 innings.

The winners will be selected using the SABR Defensive Index and announced on November 3rd, per sabr.org.

Luis Robert Exits With Minor Hand Injury; X-Rays Negative

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9:52pm: X-rays came back negative, Van Schouwen tweets. Robert’s day to day with a sore right hand.

9:38pm: White Sox phenom Luis Robert left the team’s game early Tuesday after an attempt at a diving catch in the seventh inning, James Fegan of The Athletic reports. Robert was “shaking his right hand,” per Daryl Van Schouwen of the Chicago Sun-Times. The White Sox replaced him with Luis Gonzalez.

While it’s unclear whether this will prove to be a serious injury, but any notable absence for the 23-year-old Robert would be a significant blow to the White Sox. The long-hyped prospect has more than lived up to the billing in his first major league season, and has emerged as a serious American League Rookie of the Year candidate. Through the initial 95 plate appearances of his career, Robert has slashed .276/.330/.517 (130 wRC+) with five home runs, four stolen bases and 1.1 fWAR.

Aside from Robert and Gonzalez, Adam Engel’s the only member of the White Sox who has played center this year. However, the club placed Engel on the injured list Monday because he may have come into contact with someone who has the coronavirus.

Prospect Faceoff: Robert v. Adell

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There isn’t much doubt that the White Sox’s Luis Robert and the Angels’ Jo Adell are the two best outfield prospects in baseball. The prospect gurus at Baseball America, MLB.com and FanGraphs all rank the two that way, and they also place them among the top farmhands in baseball no matter the position. Robert (No. 2 overall at BA, No. 3 at MLB.com and No. 7 at FanGraphs) holds a small edge over Adell (No. 3 at BA, No. 6 at MLB.com and No. 4 at FanGraphs) at two of the three outlets, but they’re lumped so close together that the difference is negligible.

The Cuba-born Robert has already landed a pair of lucrative contracts during his time in professional baseball. Now 22 years old, Robert joined the White Sox in 2017 for a $26MM signing bonus. Robert has since destroyed minor league pitching, including during a 2019 campaign in which he earned his first promotion to Triple-A ball. He batted .297/.341/.634 (136 wRC+) with 16 home runs in 223 plate appearances at that level, though his strikeout and walk rates were below average (24.7% K, 4.9% BB). Robert’s production was enough to convince the White Sox to make yet another sizable investment in him. This past January, they inked Robert to a six-year, $50MM guarantee – a record for a player with no major league service time (the move has gone over quite well). The deal paved the way for Robert to begin as the White Sox’s center fielder in 2020, if a season actually happens.

Adell, meanwhile, probably won’t open 2020 on the Angels’ roster, but it might not be long before he forces his way up and takes the reins in right field. He may be able to play all three outfield spots, but the team already has Justin Upton in left and pretty good player named Mike Trout in center. Before Adell gets to Anaheim, the soon-to-be 21-year-old – who became an Angel when they chose him 10th overall in 2017 – will likely have to improve his production in Triple-A. Adell had little to no success there last season, hitting .264/.321/.355 (67 wRC+) with no homers, a 32.6 percent strikeout rate and a 7.6 walk rate over 132 PA, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that he has been extraordinarily productive in the minors. It was only a year ago, for instance, that Adell returned from early season hamstring and ankle injuries to bat .308/.390/.553 (173 wRC+) across 182 PA in Double-A, thereby earning a promotion.

Baseball America regards both Robert and Adell as potential franchise players in the making. Robert obviously has the Triple-A track record on his side, but that doesn’t mean he’ll end up as the more valuable major leaguer. If we’re to believe prospect experts, you really can’t lose between the two of them, but which one would you rather bet on going forward?

(Poll link for app users)

MLBTR Poll: The Luis Robert Extension

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Super-talented, MLB-ready 22-year-olds don’t grow on trees. If you do happen upon one, what are the odds they perfectly fit your roster need and contention window? Viewed from that perspective, and accounting for the context of MLB player valuation, the $50MM risk the White Sox took on Luis Robert is a slam dunk.

Of course, all of that guaranteed cash is payable over a six-year term — the precise amount of time the club could’ve enjoyed him in the majors even without promising another dime. And it could’ve been nearly seven full seasons with a bit of service-time trickery. So, the South Siders are only gaining control over one or two seasons of would-be free agency. (Which is it? Depends upon one’s cynicism levels. And the as-yet-unknown question whether Robert will need to spend further time in the minors once he reaches the big leagues.)

Presuming the options are exercised, the deal maxes out at $88MM over eight campaigns. And that’s on top of the $26MM that the team spent just to lure Robert into the organization in the first place! Compare that to Mookie Betts, one of the game’s most productive younger players, who just secured a record-setting $27MM salary for his final trip through arbitration. The Red Sox and Dodgers got 6+ seasons of Betts for a total cost of about $60MM in salary.

Now, there’s inflation to consider. Betts’s earnings wouldn’t have been nearly that robust had he debuted six seasons earlier. If Robert can produce something like Betts, he’ll surely out-earn Mookie. And the White Sox are picking up one or two added seasons of control, which could be quite valuable. We know how much the Dodgers valued the chance to control Betts for just one season, even while paying him a big salary. Again: if Robert has a career path of that kind, then those option years will be an enormous boon to the White Sox.

The thing is, it’s not really reasonable to compare Robert to a guy like Betts. Can he perform to that level? Sure, he’s considered one of the very best prospects in all of baseball for a reason. But that’s hardly the likeliest outcome. Even putting aside the question of talent and production, there are numerous hiccups that can stall a player’s arbitration earning power. Carlos Correa is only earning $7.4MM in his second-to-last arb-eligible campaign — less than half of what contemporary Francisco Lindor will earn ($16.7MM). Rewind two years and these guys looked like a coin flip on value. As it turns out, Correa dealt with ill-timed injuries that significantly dented his ability to earn via arbitration.

Running the numbers, it’s hard to imagine you could really go much higher with an up-front guarantee for a pre-MLB player — at least, perhaps, unless the team was able to pick up yet more future control. The Robert contract, which tops the White Sox’ deal last year with Eloy Jimenez, included a pretty hefty premium to achieve cost certainty and some added control (along with, perhaps, the ability to promote him on Opening Day 2020 without concern for service time). That said, the White Sox have an excellent track record with extensions, having achieved big value in the past with players such as Chris Sale and Adam Eaton.

How do you view the deal? (Poll link for app users.)

Quick Hits: Turner, Pomeranz, Robert

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A pair of notable free agents joined new teams this afternoon. With those moves complete, we’ll round up a few more odds and ends from the weekend.

  • Nationals’ shortstop Trea Turner underwent surgery on his problematic index finger last November. Now, he’s primed to enter 2020 at full strength, he tells reporters (including Mark Zuckerman of MASN). “I’ve started hitting. I can hit with 10 fingers, so it’s good,” Turner told reporters. As Zuckerman notes, Turner played almost all of the 2019 season with nine healthy fingers after fracturing the digit on a hit-by-pitch in the first week of April. The injury hardly seemed to hold him back, as Turner slashed .298/.353/.497 (117 wRC+) with 19 home runs and 35 stolen bases as Washington’s primary shortstop and leadoff hitter.
  • Drew Pomeranz had upwards of six offers this offseason, he tells Jeff Sanders of the San Diego Union-Tribune. Nevertheless, the Padres’ surprising decision to offer a four year deal, coupled with Pomeranz’s enjoyable experience in his prior stint in San Diego, inspired him to rejoin the Friars. As Sanders details, the 31-year-old is a much different pitcher than he was in 2016, when he earned his only All-Star appearance in San Diego. Pomeranz made a full-time move to the bullpen last season in San Francisco, and a velocity uptick and increased willingness to attack the strike zone helped him dominate following a midseason trade to the Brewers.
  • Following their extension last week, the White Sox have now invested over $100MM in Luis Robert before his major league debut, observes Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic. As Rosenthal explains, the Sox paid over $25MM in overage taxes while guaranteeing Robert $26MM as an amateur under the prior international spending rules. (Spending on international amateurs was hard capped following the 2016-17 signing period, so deals like Robert’s are no longer permissible). Nevertheless, Rosenthal argues, the extension makes perfect sense for the White Sox. Not only does it grant Chicago an extra season of team control, it creates a ceiling for Robert’s earnings in arbitration, he points out. While Robert was wise to secure the guarantee, Rosenthal opines, the agreement serves as the latest reminder that MLB’s economic landscape drastically underpays players at the beginnings of their careers, when they are likely to be their most productive. MLBTR readers certainly anticipate Robert’s becoming an impact player, with 56% of poll voters forecasting him to exceed 2.3 wins above replacement in his first season.

MLBTR Poll: Luis Robert’s Rookie Season

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The White Sox recently made their latest bold move in a winter full of them, signing center fielder Luis Robert to a six-year, $50MM extension last week. Although the 22-year-old Robert has never played above the Triple-A level, setting his price for the foreseeable future came off as a worthwhile risk by the White Sox. Those types of gambles have become a trend for the club, which took the same approach before last season in inking left fielder Eloy Jimenez to a six-year, $43MM guarantee. Because Chicago was no longer concerned about Jimenez’s service time after extending him, he predictably cracked its Opening-Day roster. As expected, Jimenez went on to further establish himself as an integral long-term building block for the White Sox.

The team no doubt expects Robert to follow Jimenez’s lead this year in cementing himself as a foundational piece. Odds are that Robert, like Jimenez last year, will get a chance to do so from Day 1 of the season. Assuming that’s the case, he’ll take over for the White Sox’s most common center fielders from 2019 – Leury Garcia and Adam Engel – as their primary option. Garcia and Engel combined for a a passable 2.1 fWAR last season, though they didn’t offer much at the plate, totaling an unimposing .269/.308/.379 batting line with 14 home runs and 18 stolen bases.

Considering Robert has no experience in the majors, there’s no guarantee he’ll outproduce Garcia and Engel in his first taste of the majors. On the other hand, as en elite prospect (MLB.com ranks him third in the game) who has run roughshod over high-minors pitching, Robert’s a legitimate candidate to begin his career with a flourish. Robert hadn’t played above High-A ball until last season, when he destroyed Double-A (.314/.362/.518 in 244 plate appearances) en route to a promotion to Triple-A Charlotte. There was no shortage of offense in the International League, but the .297/.341/.634 slash Robert registered in 223 attempts was still 36 percent better than the league’s average hitter, according to FanGraphs’ wRC+ metric.

It’s too much to ask for Robert to hit that well in the majors this season, of course. Nevertheless, projections on his rookie season are bullish. For instance, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS system calls for 2.3 fWAR, a .265/.309/.455 line, 20 homers and 24 steals over 539 plate appearances. That would go down as a similar first full season to the one Nationals budding star center fielder Victor Robles recorded in 2019, an age-22, 617-PA campaign in which he posted 2.5 fWAR, slashed .255/.326/.419, swatted 17 HRs and stole 28 bases.

For the purpose of this poll, we’ll set the WAR over/under at ZiPS’ forecast, 2.3. Do you expect Robert to meet, exceed or fall short of that figure in 2020?

(Poll link for app users)

AL Notes: Yanks, Happ, Astros, Harris, White Sox, Robert

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Here’s an early morning look around the American League…

  • Even after losing right-hander Domingo German to an 81-game suspension for a violation of the league’s domestic violence policy, the Yankees “remain open to trading” lefty J.A. Happ, Ken Davidoff of the New York Post writes. The Yankees were of the belief German would serve a significant suspension all along, so the league’s decision hasn’t affected their plans regarding Happ. The big question continues to be whether they’ll be able to find a taker for Happ, who’s 37 years old, coming off a poor season and due $17MM in 2020. Happ also has a $17MM option for 2021 that will vest if he amasses 165 innings or totals 27 starts this year.  He posted back-to-back 30-start seasons from 2018-19.
  • The Nationals reeled in the top reliever left in free agency on Thursday, agreeing to a three-year, $24MM contract with righty Will Harris. The 35-year-old entered free agency off a long and fruitful run in Houston, but Harris explained to Mark Berman of Fox 26 that the Astros “were eliminated pretty early on in the process” because they weren’t prepared to approach his asking price. “They weren’t in that ballpark, no. They had kind of admitted to me they would’ve liked to have done more, but they weren’t able to.” Harris is now the latest key Astro to leave last season’s AL pennant-winning club, joining Gerrit Cole and Wade Miley. Robinson Chirinos could be the next to go.
  • In another of Thursday’s major news items, the White Sox locked up center field prospect Luis Robert to a six-year, $50MM guarantee. The two sides began negotiations back in September, and those talks gained steam at last month’s Winter Meetings, according to general manager Rick Hahn (via Scott Merkin of MLB.com). Now that Robert’s long-term future is settled, there’s no reason for the White Sox to worry about his service time, so it appears likely he’ll crack their roster out of camp. Robert’s fully confident that will happen. “I’m 100 percent convinced I’m going to be on the Opening Day roster,” the 22-year-old said.

White Sox Sign Luis Robert To Long-Term Deal

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1:33pm: The White Sox have announced the contract. Robert will earn $1.5MM in 2020, $3.5MM in 2021, $6MM in 2022, $9.5MM in 2023, $12.5MM in 2024 and $15MM in 2025.

12:07pm: The White Sox have reached a long-term agreement with center field prospect Luis Robert, Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports. The deal includes $50MM in guaranteed money over six years, and it features two club options, per Jeff Passan of ESPN. The max value is $88MM over eight years, including $20MM club options for 2026-27 with $2MM buyouts in each of the two seasons, Passan adds. It’s a record-setting accord for a player who hasn’t yet debuted in the majors.

This will already be the second lucrative contract for the 22-year-old Robert, whom the White Sox signed out of Cuba for a $26MM bonus a couple months into the 2017 season. Robert has justified his payday since then, as he’s now regarded as one of the majors’ premier prospects. He ran roughshod over the high minors last season, batting .297/.341/.634 with 16 home runs in 223 plate appearances during his first (and maybe only) taste of Triple-A action.

As MLBTR’s Mark Polishuk recently noted when exploring a potential extension for Robert, he’s the latest White Sox outfielder to land a new deal before ever playing in the majors. The club signed outfielder Eloy Jimenez to a six-year, $43MM pact – then a record for an early career extension – shortly before last season started. Jimenez has more than lived up to the decision so far, having finished 2019 among the majors’ most successful rookies.

The Robert pact gives the White Sox an extra year of control over him, as they’re now slated to keep him through 2027 instead of ’26. Plus, if all goes well, it could tamp down massive arbitration earnings for Robert. Regardless, the White Sox now have at least two-thirds of an extremely enviable young outfield between him and Jimenez. And if recent trade acquisition Nomar Mazara, 24, begins living up to his vast potential, Chicago could possess one of the sport’s premier outfields for the foreseeable future.

Now that there’s no need to manipulate his service time, it seems likely Robert will open 2020 as the White Sox’s everyday center fielder. So, for the most part, the team’s Opening-Day lineup for the upcoming season appears set. The White Sox also have Jimenez (left), Mazara (right), Yoan Moncada (third base) and Tim Anderson (shortstop) as key members of their young offensive core. Sluggers Jose Abreu and Edwin Encarnacion (DH/1B) and catcher Yasmani Grandal will supplement that group, with a potential-packed rotation set to consist of some combination of Lucas Giolito, Dallas Keuchel, Reynaldo Lopez, Dylan Cease, Gio Gonzalez, Michael Kopech and Carlos Rodon.

Last decade was one to forget for the White Sox, who haven’t made the playoffs since 2008 or finished above .500 since 2012. But judging by general manager Rick Hahn’s actions this winter, including Robert’s contract, they’re all-in on changing their fortunes as early as this year.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Extension Candidate: Luis Robert

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Is there any prospect quite as exciting as a blue chip center fielder?  White Sox fans have been eagerly awaiting the arrival of Luis Robert ever since he signed for a $26MM bonus with the team back in May 2017.  It was a contract that put the Sox in the proverbial “penalty box” under the old international signing rules, yet the splurge seemed more than worthwhile given the Cuban outfielder’s potential.

Robert’s early progress was hampered by ankle and knee injuries, as well as a thumb sprain.  But, with a clean bill of health in 2019, Robert set upon tearing up the minor leagues, hitting a cumulative .328/.376/.624 with 32 homers and 36 stolen bases (out of 47 steal attempts) over 551 plate appearances for three different White Sox affiliates.  Robert moved from high-A Winston-Salem to Triple-A Charlotte by season’s end, and though he only has 47 games and 223 PA at the Triple-A level, his .974 OPS in Charlotte left little doubt that the 22-year-old Robert is ready for the majors.

White Sox GM Rick Hahn feels the same way, telling reporters in his end-of-year press conference that the Chicago front office didn’t see center field as an area of need this winter since Robert was slated to handle the position for much of the 2020 season.  As to when Robert could make his debut, however, is still up in the air, leaving open the possibility that the Sox could erase all service-time concerns and lock him into the Opening Day outfield by simply inking Robert to an extension.

If this scenario sounds familiar, the White Sox did the exact same thing with another star prospect in Eloy Jimenez last spring.  Before even appearing in a Major League game, Jimenez signed a six-year extension worth $43MM in guaranteed money, and could end up earning $75MM over an eight-year span if the contract’s two club options are exercised.  The deal far exceeded the previous record extension for a player without any MLB experience, which was a six-year/$24MM guarantee for Scott Kingery from the Phillies prior to the 2018 season.  (The Mariners and first base prospect Evan White also agreed to a six-year pact for $24MM in guaranteed salary this past November.)

Robert’s representatives are obviously likely to aim for an extension that will surpass Jimenez’s deal, with the argument that their client offers more future value.  Like Jimenez, Robert is a top-five prospect in the eyes of MLB.com and Baseball America — which rank him third on their top-100 prospect rankings — while Baseball Prospectus’ midseason top 50 ranking placed him fourth.  While Jimenez’s batting ability is renowned, however, evaluators aren’t certain if he’ll be able to offer much defensively as a corner outfielder, and a move to first base could be necessary even within a few seasons.

In Robert’s case, while there is some question as to whether he’ll stick as a center fielder over the long term, he certainly projects to play up the middle for at least the opening portion of his career, which only adds to his five-tool potential.  His 30-30 season across the minors in 2019 indicated his power and speed, and BA and MLB.com rank his throwing arm in the 55-60 range on the 20-80 scouting scale.  Robert’s plate discipline is perhaps still a work in progress since he only posted 28 walks against 129 strikeouts last season, though it isn’t unusual for any young player to deal with a lot of swing-and-miss early in his career.  MLB.com’s scouting report cites Yoan Moncada as a possible comp, and Moncada significantly reduced his own strikeout problems (a league-high 217 in 2018 to 154 in 2019) with the help of Chicago’s hitting coaches.

Beyond the argument that Robert has the higher ceiling than Jimenez, Robert can also seek the higher deal since he has less incentive to sign an extension.  Robert already has that $26MM, remember, so he has already banked one life-changing fortune from his baseball career.  (Jimenez, by contrast, had “only” his initial $2.8MM signing bonus from the Cubs.)  Unless the White Sox were to offer Robert something far above and beyond Jimenez’s contract, Robert might prefer to just bet on himself and see how his initial season or seasons progress before considering long-term deals.

Without an extension in place, the White Sox could keep Robert in the minors for at least the first few weeks of the season, or at least long enough to ensure that they’ll get a seventh year of control over his services.  This would be the latest instance of a team manipulating a top prospect’s service time, and this entire practice has been put under the microscope this offseason now that Kris Bryant’s service time grievance is currently being examined by an arbitrator.  While the arbitrator is widely expected to rule in the Cubs’ favor, a decision reducing Bryant’s remaining team control from two years to one would send many shockwaves around the baseball world, and impact how every club handles promoting its best minor leaguers in the future.  As such, the White Sox might wait until the arbitrator’s ruling before fully diving into extension negotiations with Robert.

Beyond Jimenez, Hahn has extended several other promising White Sox players (i.e. Tim Anderson, Adam Eaton, Jose Quintana, Chris Sale) early in their careers over his seven-plus years as general manager.  A potential Robert contract could be the most unique and, in fact, most expensive of the bunch, though it would mark the latest aggressive move in a winter that has already seen Yasmani Grandal, Edwin Encarnacion, Dallas Keuchel, and Gio Gonzalez come to the South Side in free agency.  Since the club’s rebuild is clearly over, making Chicago’s center fielder of the future into part of the present could be the next step in the lead-up to the most anticipated White Sox Opening Day in years.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

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