Luis Robert Jr. keeps landing in the same conversation: how long can a team keep paying for the player he might be instead of the one he’s actually been?
That question is front and center again as Robert heads into free agency, coming off a season that was better than his recent work but still not enough to erase the injury history and uneven production that have followed him since his 2023 breakout with the White Sox. Chicago saw the best version of Robert that year, when he hit .264/.315/.542 with a 129 wRC+ in 145 games, launched 38 home runs, stole 20 bases, and piled up +12 Outs Above Average in center field. FanGraphs credited him with 5.0 wins above replacement, the kind of season that made the six-year, $55MM deal he signed in January 2020 look like a steal.
The shine didn’t last. A right hip flexor strain limited Robert to 100 games in 2024, and left hamstring strains cost him more time in 2025, when he played only 110 games.
Across 856 plate appearances from 2024-25, he hit just .223 with a .660 OPS and an 85 wRC+, while still managing 28 homers and 56 steals. Even with some improvement in his strikeout and walk numbers in 2025, he was worth only 1.3 fWAR that season.
Chicago had to decide whether to keep betting on the upside. The White Sox picked up Robert’s $20MM club option for 2026, then moved on anyway, trading him to the Mets in January for Luisangel Acuña and minor league right-hander Truman Pauley.
Robert’s time with New York was interrupted by a lumbar spine disc herniation that sidelined him for three months, and the Orioles later claimed him on waivers on August 31st, taking on roughly $5MM of the remaining salary. Baltimore then dealt with left hamstring discomfort that kept him out for three weeks.
Between the Mets and Orioles, Robert got only 230 plate appearances. He hit .221/.300/.407, with 11 home runs and two stolen bases.
There were some encouraging signs in the underlying numbers: his 23.9% strikeout rate and 10.4% walk rate were his best in years, with the walk rate standing as a career best. His 89.8 mph average exit velocity was solidly above average, and his .186 isolated power was his best since the 2023 breakout.
Still, the overall line came in below league average, even if his 97 wRC+ and .707 OPS looked a lot healthier than his 2024-25 numbers.
That wasn’t enough for Baltimore to keep him. The Orioles paid a $2MM buyout instead of exercising their option for 2027, leaving Robert to hit the market for the first time.
MLBTR ranks him No. 43 on its Top 50 Free Agents list and projects him for a one-year, $14MM deal. The Padres, Reds, and Royals are mentioned as speculative fits.
The larger issue is what kind of player teams think they’re buying. Robert is still being viewed through the lens of upside, but the gap between that upside and his recent production keeps widening. His 145-game season in 2023 remains a career high, and since then hip, hamstring, and back problems have kept him out for nearly half of his team’s games.
There’s a natural comparison here with Byron Buxton, another gifted center fielder whose talent has always had to be weighed against availability. Buxton signed a seven-year, $100MM extension with the Twins in November 2021 after posting wRC+ marks of 112, 121, and 171 from 2019-21 while appearing in 187 of 384 possible games.
Since the start of 2022, though, Buxton has still been worth 15.2 fWAR for Minnesota. He has earned $71MM on that extension so far, including $69MM in salary, a $1MM signing bonus, and $1MM in incentives for topping 533 plate appearances last year.
That works out to $4.67MM per WAR.
Robert’s side of the comparison is a lot less flattering. Since the start of 2024, he has earned $49.5MM while producing just 2.4 fWAR, which comes out to $20.6MM per WAR.
The point isn’t that he lacks talent. It’s that the production has not matched the paycheck.
Even now, there are reasons teams will keep looking. Robert won’t turn 30 until August of next year.
He was still worth +7 OAA last year, and Statcast had him as an elite runner in 2026, with a 28.9 feet/second sprint speed that ranked in the 88th percentile. At the same time, further hamstring trouble could chip away at his range, and he’s no longer the elite defender he was in 2023.
If Robert gets only a one-year deal for 2027, he may be banking on another thin center field market in the 2027-28 offseason. Steven Kwan is currently projected as the top free agent at the position, and Robert still looks better, from a pure talent standpoint, than Harrison Bader, Kyle Isbel, and Matt Vierling.
But 2027 may also be his last real shot to turn the promise he flashed in 2023 into something more lasting. If the injuries and inconsistency show up again, the eight-figure offers could dry up fast.
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