Not a long one here, but while y’all were celebrating Andruw Jones’ election to the Hall of Fame, the Mets traded for Luis Robert Jr. That completed a years-long flirtation between the White Sox and literally anyone even remotely interested in Robert’s services.
In the end, though, all the White Sox got were Luisangel Acuña and a 12th-round overslot signee arm from last year’s draft that registers as a fringy prospect at best. Not to denigrate Ronald Acuña Jr.’s younger brother too much, but Luisangel looks
like an all-glove utility infielder based on his 200ish PAs of MLB exposure thus far, and a big chunk of his defensive value to date came in a cup of coffee in 2024 as he posted +0 FRV in about two months of play last year.
In the end, the White Sox probably rue not trading Robert after his resurgent 2023 season (4.9 fWAR). I guess trading him after his 1.3 fWAR 2025 is better than after his 0.6 fWAR 2024… maaaaybeeee… considering that they’re trading just one year of control now versus two had they traded him earlier. (Robert has a club option for 2027, but at $20 million, it’s not clear that it’ll be exercised, especially since the buyout is just $2 million.)
You could argue that the White Sox didn’t bungle much aside from not moving him after 2023, as Robert has been feeble enough at the dish since that trading him post-2024 versus post-2025 doesn’t really matter. But, I’ll leave those specifics to you.
