Ready for Victor Robles

It’s the double-R that makes it difficult. In the title Victor Robles, all the emphasis is front-loaded. Victor is spondaic and Robles is trochaic, which suggests three pressured syllables in a row adopted by that one final unstressed syllable: VIC-TOR RO-bles. It’s a shout adopted by a whisper, which doesn’t precisely roll off the tongue. But even when you cheat a bit of bit and switch the primary title right into a trochee — VIC-tor RO-bles, sing-songy like Mickey Mantle or Dr Pepper — you continue to can’t get it to circulate as a result of you might want to pause between these two Rs, lest the 2 names get pressed collectively into one breathless pileup of syllables: victorrobles. No matter what you attempt, that emphatic begin grinds to a halt.

After greater than 10 years and almost as many false begins, the middle fielder’s time with the Washington Nationals has come to an entire cease. The staff designated Robles for task on Monday, eight days after his twenty seventh birthday. They now have per week to commerce, waive, outright, or launch him. Robles, who’s in his eighth season as a giant leaguer, would virtually actually choose without spending a dime company moderately than settle for an outright task to the minors. Despite his struggles, he appears prone to garner one other alternative. To Washington followers who had been dreaming on him since 2015, Robles typically appeared tantalizingly near lastly breaking out. Over the course of his profession, Robles has a mixed .725 OPS in his first 10 video games of a season and a mixed .576 OPS in his final 10. He has a profession 93 wRC+ in March and April; May is the one different month when he’s inside 10 factors of that mark. Many of these sizzling begins have been additionally marred by early-season accidents: a hyper-extended elbow in April 2018, a sprained ankle in May 2021, again spasms in May 2023, a strained hamstring this April. He simply by no means discovered a technique to hold it going.

Robles began with a bang, placing up an .891 OPS as a 17-year-old within the 2014 Dominican Summer League after signing for simply $225,000 in 2013. Jarret Seidler referred to as him a “a nothing signing who showed up stateside with a bunch of polished potential 7 tools.” Robles first appeared in these pages in January 2015, when Kiley McDaniel mentioned that these instruments and a complicated method on the plate may permit him to shoot up Washington’s prospect rankings. He did simply that, rating third on the 2016 staff checklist, then first in 2017 and 2018, peaking at fourth general that yr. There was a time when it was affordable to marvel whether or not you’d moderately construct a franchise round Robles or Ronald Acuña Jr. The graph beneath is from September of 2017, when the median projection from KATOH+ had Robles at 12.5 WAR in his first six years:

It was alleged to be Robles, not Juan Soto, who led the following technology of Nationals stars, however after a cup of espresso in 2017, issues got here to their first halt in April 2018. That’s when Robles hyper-extended his elbow and Soto acquired referred to as as much as Washington, by no means to smell the minor leagues (or second billing) once more. Robles acquired one other cup of espresso in September, then spent all of 2019 with the large membership, placing up 3.7 WAR and ending sixth in NL Rookie of the Year voting.

To that time, Robles had been value 4.3 WAR in 189 massive league video games, placing up a 96 wRC+ that appeared to vow a shiny future. It seemed just like the one query in all these glowing scouting stories — whether or not he’d ever have the ability to faucet into some energy — had lastly been answered. After reaching 10 homers in a season simply as soon as within the minors, he launched 17 as a 22-year-old in 2019. His protection was each bit nearly as good as marketed; his 21 OAA was fourth-best in baseball, his 23 DRS sixth. However, there have been worries lurking beneath these numbers. Batted ball luck was propping them up, and his stroll fee was miles decrease than it had been within the minors. Before the 2019 season, JJ Cooper famous his concerningly low exit velocities, and Robles certainly put up a giant league-worst 83.3-mph common exit velocity that yr.

They name batting traces like these unsustainable for a purpose. The as soon as precocious method and really feel for contact failed to carry up on the highest stage; Robles posted a 15.7% strikeout fee within the minors, however a 23.3% fee within the majors. Not solely did he fail to develop into any energy, he completed within the first percentile in exit velocity 4 years in a row. As far because it’s attainable to inform from the skin, he appeared to be placing within the work. In 2020, he placed on 15 kilos of muscle so as to improve his energy output. When the additional weight as an alternative resulted in a lack of velocity, he slimmed again down on the staff’s request and labored on shortening his swing and being fast to the ball. Since 2020, Robles has a wRC+ of 70, which makes him the fifth-worst hitter in baseball over that stretch (minimal 1,000 PAs). The pizzicato brilliance of the 2019 season stands out starkly. Over components of eight seasons, Robles has been value 4.6 WAR, placing up 24.8 defensive runs, 6.6 baserunning runs, and -44.7 runs on the plate. If you take away 2019, his WAR drops to 0.86:

For followers who’d been studying glowing scouting stories since his teenage years, it was arduous to cease dreaming on Robles. Instead, these desires grew much less and fewer fantastical over time. When he was a prospect, he seemed like he could possibly be the face of the franchise. After his manufacturing cratered, he seemed like he might nonetheless be a stable, glove-first middle fielder. Last season, Washington followers hoped merely that he could possibly be one of many few league-average gamers on a cellar-bound staff. Over a brief pattern of 36 video games, Robles provided hope that he is perhaps enhancing his plate self-discipline and making extra contact, however again spasms despatched him to the IL in May, then ended his season in June. This season, he suffered a hamstring pressure after simply 4 video games, and when he returned, he put up a wRC+ of 10 over 10 video games. The occasional psychological error, previously chalked as much as the exuberance of youth, began to grate. With Lane Thomas coming back from the IL, there was not room for Robles.

As with any high prospect who doesn’t fairly pan out, we’re left questioning tips on how to assign blame. Did Robles fail to dwell as much as his promise, did the staff’s participant growth fail to domesticate it, or have been we flawed about that promise within the first place? The solutions to these questions are arduous to separate, particularly together with his profession not but concluded. Washington’s participant growth has been lagging for a while now. Scouting has modified considerably within the final 10 years, and if Robles have been to seem as a prospect once more right now, he’d doubtless be ranked a bit decrease.

There’s one thing darkly comedic about the truth that failing to develop is what allowed Robles to stay round for therefore lengthy, whereas Soto’s ascent into superstardom made him too beneficial to stay on a rebuilding and all of a sudden cost-conscious Nationals staff. It’s solely now, with Robles making $2.65 million in his stroll yr — fifth-highest on the staff, in comparison with Jacob Young’s league-minimum wage — and with Washington beginning to consider that they’re nearing competition, that persistence has lastly run out. Robles lastly misplaced his spot to Thomas, whose profession acquired off to a sluggish begin earlier than he put up a 3.1-win season in, you guessed it, his age-27 season. We’ll discover out quickly whether or not Robles is traded, waived, or just launched, and which staff needs their shot at lastly getting — and preserving — him going.