{"id":118361,"date":"2025-06-20T16:40:09","date_gmt":"2025-06-20T16:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/118361\/"},"modified":"2025-06-20T16:40:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-20T16:40:09","slug":"white-sox-willing-to-include-cash-in-trade-talks-on-benintendi-robert","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/118361\/","title":{"rendered":"White Sox Willing To Include Cash In Trade Talks On Benintendi, Robert"},"content":{"rendered":"

The White Sox, sporting a 23-52 record, will operate as deadline sellers once again. They don\u2019t have as much to offer as many other potential sellers around the league \u2014 partly because they\u2019ve already sold off many desirable assets earlier in this rebuild but also due to the significant salaries of some of their remaining veterans. To that end, Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon of The Athletic report<\/a> that the South Siders are willing to include cash to help pay down the salaries on pricey outfielders Luis Robert Jr.<\/a> and Andrew Benintendi<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Heading into the season, GM Chris Getz<\/a> surely hoped that wouldn\u2019t be necessary with regard to Robert, in particular. The 27-year-old has performed at a superstar level in the past when healthy. As recently as 2023, Robert slashed .264\/.314\/.542 (128 wRC+) with 38 home runs, 20 steals and elite center field defense in 145 games. That\u2019s the only season in Robert\u2019s career where he\u2019s played more than 100 games, however. Injuries have repeatedly dogged the electric young outfielder, and he\u2019s now been hitting poorly for more than a year.<\/p>\n

Since Opening Day 2024, Robert has turned in an anemic .212\/.276\/.351 batting line (75 wRC+). He\u2019s fanned in 32.5% of his plate appearances and, in 2025 specifically, been extremely prone to harmless infield pop-ups; 11 of Robert\u2019s 155 batted balls this season (7.1%) have been infield flies.<\/p>\n

Despite the run of awful production, there are some reasons for cautious optimism. Robert\u2019s strikeout rate is enormous but not too much higher than the 29% he posted during that brilliant 2023 campaign. He\u2019s also walking at a career-high 9.8% clip and chasing pitches off the plate at a career-low 31.3% rate, per Statcast. He\u2019s hitting the ball as hard as ever, averaging 90.3 mph off the bat with a 42.9% hard-hit rate. Both are his second-best marks in any season of his career. His 11% barrel rate isn\u2019t far behind his career 11.9% mark.<\/p>\n

One might expect a player with Robert\u2019s speed to slow down after a 2023 MCL injury and a Grade 3 strain of his hip flexor in 2024, but that\u2019s not the case. Robert is 22-for-27 in stolen base attempts in 2025, and Statcast measures his sprint speed at 28.8 feet per second. That\u2019s actually his fastest mark since his 2020 rookie year and places him in the 87th percentile of big leaguers. Given that plus speed, it\u2019s not surprising to see Robert way up in the 97th percentile in terms of outfield range (as measured by Statcast).<\/p>\n

Robert is hitting the ball hard, playing strong defense, showing more patience than ever before and running better than he has since his rookie season. He\u2019s also hitting .190\/.273\/.303. It\u2019s a confounding state of affairs, but as sharp as the tools may look, the results are clearly going to weigh down his trade value. Many teams with needs in the outfield would love to roll the dice on a Robert rebound following a change of scenery \u2014 just not at his current price tag.<\/p>\n

This is the final guaranteed season of Robert\u2019s six-year, $50MM contract, but the deal contains a pair of $20MM club options for 2026 and 2027. If he can turn things around, there\u2019s still bargain potential. The Sox missed the boat not trading Robert coming off that 2023 season, but if they\u2019re willing to pay down some of this year\u2019s $15MM salary and the $2MM buyout on Robert\u2019s 2026 club option, they could likely find a taker who\u2019d be willing to give up some degree of prospect value. He\u2019s a gamble, but a high-upside one who can be controlled for two more years at reasonable rates. There\u2019s jackpot potential for a new team, and if things don\u2019t work out in the final couple months, said club could always hit the \u201ceject\u201d button and decline Robert\u2019s 2026 option.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a slightly different story with Benintendi. While Robert has been on the downswing for more than a year, Benintendi has increasingly looked like his old self at the plate for more than a calendar year now. He quietly turned things around midseason last year and is slashing .251\/.321\/.468 with 24 homers, 24 doubles, two triples, a 9.1% walk rate and an 18.4% strikeout rate in his past 515 plate appearances. By measure of wRC+, that\u2019s 20% better than average at the plate.<\/p>\n

Benintendi\u2019s speed is down a bit since his peak, however, and at 30 years old he now grades out as a below-average left fielder. A team that buys into his production dating back to last year might view Benitendi as a serviceable multi-year option in left field. However, he\u2019s being paid $16.5MM this year and next, and his contract calls for a $14.5MM salary in 2027.<\/p>\n

Benintendi almost certainly would command less than the two years and $31MM he\u2019s owed for 2026-27 if he were a free agent, but he\u2019s also no longer the total sunk cost he looked to be a year and a half into his five-year contract with Chicago. If the Sox eat half the remaining contract or more, they might well find an interested taker. Plenty of contenders and playoff hopefuls are looking for outfield help; the Padres, Royals, Reds and Dodgers have all gotten poor production from left field this year.<\/p>\n

The ChiSox won\u2019t necessarily need to eat salary to move some of their other available players, but speculatively speaking, their willingness to do so on Robert and Benintendi could be a sign they\u2019re willing to do so elsewhere. Aaron Civale<\/a>\u2019s $8MM salary isn\u2019t prohibitive, but a team looking for a fourth starter to supply innings down the stretch might be willing to give up a bit more if Getz & Co. pick up the tab on most or all of his salary. Mike Tauchman<\/a> ($1.95MM) and Adrian Houser<\/a> ($1.35MM) are even less expensive, but covering some of that cash could be particularly beneficial to teams angling to stay under the luxury threshold.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The White Sox, sporting a 23-52 record, will operate as deadline sellers once again. They don\u2019t have as…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":118362,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2379],"tags":[2132,11710,1000,5,138,49,2561,369,6647,4,396,2562],"class_list":{"0":"post-118361","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chicago-white-sox","8":"tag-aaron-civale","9":"tag-adrian-houser","10":"tag-andrew-benintendi","11":"tag-baseball","12":"tag-chicago","13":"tag-chicago-white-sox","14":"tag-chicagowhitesox","15":"tag-luis-robert","16":"tag-mike-tauchman","17":"tag-mlb","18":"tag-white-sox","19":"tag-whitesox"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/114716686882377838","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118361"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118361\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}