In an otherwise forgettable season for the Chicago White Sox, Luis Robert Jr. experienced a breakout during the 2023 campaign. While the White Sox finished the season with a 61-101 record, Robert posted a 128 wRC+ and a career-high 4.9 fWAR over 595 plate appearances for the South Siders that year. Since this peak season, however, Robert has struggled at the plate, with an increase in swing and miss and an overly aggressive approach at the plate resulting in a regression in his overall production. These struggles have continued into 2025, with Robert producing a 59 wRC+ over his first 106 plate appearances of the season. This article will examine the factors that have led to Robert’s struggles over the past two seasons, and attempt to identify whether he will be able to achieve his 2023 peak again in the future.
Overview
Since making his Major League debut during the 2020 season, Luis Robert Jr. has been one of the most exciting players in the entire sport. While Robert has experienced troubles with injuries throughout the beginning of his Major League career, he possesses a valuable combination of plus raw power and above-average center field defense, which when it clicks together, can result in a peak season like he displayed in 2023.
As shown by the table above, Robert displayed above-average power and top-tier center field defense in 2023, which led to him producing a 4.9 fWAR over 145 games played that season. In 2024, Robert regressed in both power and center field defense which, along with an increase in strikeout rate, led to a below-average offensive output and a 0.5 fWAR over 100 games played. These struggles have continued into the 2025 season, as despite an increase in walk rate, Robert’s strikeout rate remains elevated and his overall offensive production continues to slump.
To take a look “under the hood” at the factors that are driving Robert’s decline in offensive production, the table above displays Robert’s Process+ metrics from each of the past three seasons. Robert’s ability to make contact has remained remarkably consistent over the past three seasons, producing an 88 contact grade in 2023 and 2024, and an 89 contact grade so far this season. Robert has displayed an improved decision-making ability over the past three seasons, while a consistent decline in his power grade (123 in 2023 to 99 in 2025) has been a large driver in his decline in Process+ over the past three seasons. With these overall trends of his recent performance established, let’s proceed to identify areas of improvement that Robert should focus on to improve his level of offensive production moving forward.
Areas of Improvement
As mentioned earlier, Robert has experienced some significant struggles at the plate to begin the 2025 season, producing a mere 59 wRC+ over his first 106 plate appearances. This decline in offensive production has been largely driven by his regression in power output, with his isolated power declining from a stellar .278 in 2023 to .125 so far this season.
Over the past three seasons, Robert has consistently displayed a bottom-tier ability to make contact with pitches on the “sweet spot” of the bat, as evidenced by his low squared-up rate (for reference, Robert’s 14% squared-up rate this season is in the 1st percentile among qualified hitters). Exit velocity is primarily generated through a combination of bat speed and collision efficiency, which means that Robert’s sub-par ability to square up the baseball puts a lot of pressure on his ability to possess plus bat speed to generate high exit velocities. In 2023, Robert displayed an average bat speed of 75.9, which led to him producing a 101.8 EV50 and 15.4% barrel rate during his peak season. Last season, Robert experienced a 1.4 MPH decline in average bat speed, which was at least a partial contributor to his declines in EV50 and Barrel% in 2024. To begin this season, Robert has increased his average bat speed back up to 75.0 MPH, however, the 5% decline in squared-up rate has led to a further decline in EV50 to 100.6.
In addition to his consistent decline in EV50, Robert has also consistently declined in his ability to pull the ball in the air over the past three seasons. After displaying an above-average 24.5% pull-air rate in 2023, Robert is currently displaying a below-average 14.8% mark in that stat to begin the 2025 season. Spray angle tendencies can be noisy year-to-year and it is possible that Robert could regress to an above league-average level over the remainder of the season, however, pulling a ball in the air is the batted ball profile that results in the most offensive production, and Robert’s regression in this area has been a significant contributor to his decline in offensive production.
How can Robert change his approach at the plate to reclaim his prior levels of offensive production? First, Robert should return to placing an emphasis on pulling the ball in the air to generate more power production. One means by which we can identify whether Robert is attempting an approach change at the plate is to analyze his average contact point using the batting stance and intercept data recently released on Baseball Savant.
Hitting the ball in the air requires making contact with pitches in front of home plate and, as shown by the tables above, Robert’s contact point got deeper last season relative to his center point of mass, contributing to his decline in pull-air rate. Robert has moved his average contact point more out in front of the plate this season, providing optimism that his pull-air rate might improve over the course of a full season. I will be monitoring Robert’s contact point and pull-air rate closely this season, as this will be a leading indicator as to whether he will be able to improve his power output.
Second, I wonder if Robert could benefit from bat fitting to improve his ability to make contact on the “sweet spot” of the bat. It appears that Robert utilizes a “traditionally” shaped bat, and perhaps utilizing a bat that contains more mass where he frequently makes contact will increase his squared-up rate, therefore increasing his batted ball quality. Data regarding where on the bat Robert makes contact is not publicly available, so it is impossible to determine whether Robert should use a torpedo bat or a differently shaped bat, however, his lack of ability to square up the baseball with a “traditional” bat leads me to believe that Robert would be an ideal candidate to attempt to use a differently piece of lumber. Ultimately, a new bat design could allow Robert to marginally improve his ability to square up incoming pitches, resulting in a greater collision efficiency which could result in improved batted ball profiles.
Swing Decisions
While he has been known primarily as a hitter with an aggressive approach at the plate throughout his professional career, Robert has changed his swing decision tendencies over the past two seasons, becoming slightly more passive at the plate. While a decrease in chase rate has allowed for his walk rate to increase, Robert has also become more passive on pitches inside the strike zone, resulting in more called strikes.
As shown by the table above, Robert has decreased his O-Swing% by 10.8% from 2023 to this season. This decline in propensity to chase pitches outside of the strike zone has resulted in Robert producing a career-high 14.2% walk rate so far this season, however, it appears that Robert has generally become more passive at the plate rather than improving his ability to be selective. Robert has also decreased his Z-Swing% over the past two seasons, which has resulted in more called strikes and Robert more frequently falling into disadvantageous count states. Is this adjustment in swing decision tendency good or bad for Robert? I am personally undecided, hence why this section is sandwiched between the positives and negatives of Robert’s offensive profile. I am generally biased to favor hitters who swing the bat less frequently, since very few hitters average positive run values on their swings, however, Robert has experienced more success in the past when he swings more frequently, and his high average bat speed provides him with more agency to swing the bat in general (given the high power upside if/when he makes contact). I would lean towards suggesting that he swing the bat more frequently, given his past success with this type of approach, however, I would proceed with caution as the bottom of Robert’s offensive profile could fall out completely if a more aggressive approach backfires and causes his strikeout rate to ballon.
Points of Optimism
While Robert has struggled offensively to begin the 2025 season, there are a few points of optimism present in his offensive profile that provide hope that his level of production can rebound moving forward. The first point of optimism is that Robert has improved his average bat speed from last season, from 74.5 in 2024 to 75.0 so far this season. As mentioned earlier, Robert’s sub-par ability to square up the baseball puts a lot of pressure on his bat speed to generate top-end exit velocities, and this improvement in bat speed provides optimism that last season’s regression (from 75.9 in 2023 to 74.5 in 2024) was a one year blip rather than the beginning of a decline in power ability.
A second point of optimism is that Robert has simply run into bad batted ball luck so far this season. As shown by the table above, he’s displayed an ability to run above-average BABIP’s (around .310) throughout his career due to his ability to hit the ball hard while not hitting the ball in the air at an excessively high rate. Through his first 106 plate appearances of the 2025 season, Robert has produced a .196 BABIP, well below the league-average and primed for positive regression in the near future. In addition, xwOBA agrees with Robert’s bad batted ball luck to start 2025, with there being a .046 gap between his wOBA and xwOBA to begin the season.
A final point of positivity is that projection systems are still bullish on Robert’s offensive abilities. THE BAT and OOPSY both give Robert more favorable rest-of-season projections (116 and 126 wRC+, respectively) than their counterparts, while Steamer is the most bearish on Robert’s rest-of-season projections with a 102 wRC+. Overall, these projections suggest that the outlook is not all negative for Robert moving forward, and natural batted ball regression should help improve his overall level of offensive production in the coming months.
Concluding Thoughts
From a fantasy baseball perspective, Luis Robert Jr. remains a very intriguing player due to his power-speed combination, while he is likely to struggle in the runs and runs batted in categories due to the weakness of the Chicago White Sox lineup. From a real-life baseball perspective, Robert’s profile is quite volatile as there remains an MVP-level caliber ceiling if all of his tools “click” for a season, however, his entire profile could fall off a cliff if the swing-and-miss increases and he’s moved out of center field, hampering his defensive value. I find the high-chase, high-whiff, high-power, plus up-the-middle defense players around the league generally intriguing, as they can produce a couple of MVP-level seasons in their career when they are young (think of Javier Báez in Chicago), and have their production fall off a cliff once they begin to regress offensively (think of Javier Báez in Detroit).
Such an upside still exists for Robert Jr., however, it will largely depend on his ability to maintain elite athleticism, implement meaningful adjustments at the plate, and reverse recent declines in power production. Given his age (27) and existing physical tools, betting against Robert regaining at least some of his prior levels of production would likely be unwise, however, the volatility inherent in his profile ensures that some level of risk will always remain when projecting Robert’s future production. With an improved ability to make quality contact, an increase in pulled fly ball, and some natural batted ball regression, Luis Robert Jr. will at least have a chance to reclaim the higher levels of offensive production that he experienced during his peak 2023 season.
Photo courtesy of Icon Sportswire | Adapted by Aaron Polcare
