Writing a primer on a player who it feels like Mets fans simultaneously don’t know very well but also know intimately well in Luis Robert Jr. is an interesting position to be in. The 28-year-old Cuban-born center fielder defected in 2016 and signed with the White Sox the following year, spending his entire career until this point with an American League club the Mets rarely face off against. But the Mets have also been connected to Robert in trade for nearly two full calendar years at this point and his name has been brought up at least a handful of times every trade deadline and offseason since 2024 as the Mets searched for answers to their center field problem.
If there is an overarching pair of themes that tell the story of Robert’s career, it’s injuries and sky-high potential. Robert made his spring training debut for the White Sox in 2018 and hit a go-ahead grand slam in the eighth inning, but then landed on the injured list for two months because he sprained a ligament in his thumb while sliding into second base in the game. That spring debut ended up being a microcosm for Robert’s White Sox career.
Robert’s major league debut came in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, before which he signed a six-year, $50 million contract with the White Sox before appearing in a single big league game. That contract included team options for 2026 and 2027; the White Sox picked up Robert’s 2026 option in November prior to the trade and the Mets will now be responsible for Robert’s entire $20 million salary this season. The 2027 option is also for $20 million with a $2 million buyout. Robert won a Gold Glove in his first major league season and came in second in the American League Rookie of the Year balloting. Robert also helped carry the White Sox to their first postseason berth in over a decade—shortened season wackiness notwithstanding—and hit the longest postseason home run in White Sox history in the Wild Card round against the A’s. Things were off to a promising start for the young outfielder.
He carried that momentum right into the 2021 season, in which he hit over .300 in his first 25 games before suffering a complete tear of his right hip flexor on May 2—the first of a string of devastating injuries Robert would have to deal with in his young career. That hip flexor tear cost him three months, but in only 68 games and just shy of 300 plate appearances in 2021, Robert still amassed 3.4 fWAR. Robert’s production fell the following season, as he put up a 111 wRC+ in 2022. Though he played more games (98) than in 2021, he still suffered multiple more minor injuries that year, including a sprained wrist in September that prematurely ended his season.
Robert’s best year of his career by far was his age 25 season in 2023 when he played nearly a full season (145 games), over which he put up 5 WAR, hit 38 home runs, drove in 80 runs, and stole 20 bases—all while playing elite center field defense (12 OAA). He earned All-Star honors that year, won the Silver Slugger, and came in 12th in the AL MVP voting. Though Robert still has potentially a lot of years left to play at age 28, that 2023 season unfortunately represents the zenith of his professional career so far. Perhaps most notably, Robert has not sniffed 38 home runs before 2023 or since.
In all, according to data from FOX Sports, Robert has had over thirty—that’s right 30, as in, three-zero—IL stints in six big league seasons. That’s, well, a lot of injuries. And they are not all bumps and bruises either. Some of these are significant soft tissue injuries that led to lengthy absences. Robert played in just 53% of possible games from 2021 to 2023 and has failed to reach the 145-game high-water mark from 2023 in either of his past two seasons, which have been injury-riddled and mediocre. His 2024 and 2025 seasons were basically carbon copies of each other with an 86 and 85 OPS+ respectively, worth 1.4 bWAR each, and 210 games played across both seasons.
That all seems pretty grim, but there is plenty of reason for optimism here. Even with his history of lower body injuries, Robert maintains excellent—and flashes of brilliant—center field defense with 7 OAA in 2025, landing him in the 93rd percentile. This is certainly in keeping with David Stearns’ vision for improving the team defensively. Robert also maintains elite sprint speed and stole 33 bases last season—a career high. On the offensive side of things, his bat is as speedy as his legs; the inimitable Sarah Langs pointed out that only Robert, Julio Rodríguez, and Oneil Cruz had both sprint and bat speeds in the 90th percentile or better in 2025. That is encouraging company to keep. If you take a gander at xwOBA, Luis Robert’s was the same in 2025 as one Cody Bellinger—he who put up a well above average offensive season last year, was one of the most anticipated and coveted free agent bats this offseason, and was connected to the Mets for many weeks before signing with the Yankees yesterday.
To phrase it charitably, the White Sox are not known as one of the more forward-thinking or advanced organizations in the sport. Of course, when it comes to injuries and realizing the potential evident in the underlying hitting metrics, there is some luck involved. But there is also good injury prevention strategy and hitting instruction involved too and the Mets are likely better positioned than the White Sox in these arenas to help tip the odds of 2023 Robert reappearing in their favor. And while I do think people often wave “change of scenery” around like a wand, hoping that a new team will magically fix all of a player’s woes, lifting the fog of the heinous vibes that come with three consecutive 100+ loss seasons from Robert’s view probably can’t hurt.
It’s easy to see the appeal of this trade on both sides. The Mets have traded a blocked infield prospect with no options remaining and a starting pitching prospect from a farm full of excellent young arms for a player still in his twenties who they have been targeting for years, fits the roster perfectly, and whose potential they think they can maximize. Luisangel Acuña will now have the privilege of everyday playing time to hopefully be the best version of himself. For the White Sox, Robert is the talented, but oft-injured last bastion of a core that fell spectacularly short of expectations and was slowly jettisoned, piece by piece. And Robert also committed the greatest sin of all: making money without providing the bang for that buck consistently enough. For Mets fans still aching over the scattering of our own core of the first half of the 2020s, take comfort in the fact that unlike the team from whence Robert came, this is not a teardown. Unlike Robert was in Chicago by the end of his tenure, Pete Alonso was not the only bright spot in the abyss. At best, Mets fans can dream on Robert putting up a dynamic and fun to watch 5 WAR season, solving (at least in the short-term) the team’s longstanding center field quandary, and being a part of the beginning of the Mets’ next era of success. At worst, if Robert is injured and/or underperforms, as has been the case of late, the Mets have overpaid—something they can afford to do—for one mediocre season that still has a decent chance of exceeding the production the Mets got from center field in 2025.
