Royals Listed Among Trade Deadline Fits For Division Rival's $50M Outfielder

The Kansas City Royals are stuck in no-man's land.

Coming into the season, this Royals team had every intention of making back-to-back playoff appearances. But thanks in large part to their bottom-five offense, they now sit on the outskirts of Wild Card contention at 39-46.

There's plenty of smoke floating around that the Royals could become trade deadline sellers. But just in case they can't bring themselves to wave the white flag, it's also worth continuing to examine who they might target in a buying scenario.

The Royals' needs can be summarized in a few words: outfield, outfield, and more outfield. They rank dead last in outfield fWAR at -1.8; the next-worst team is at -0.2.

On Monday, CBS Sports' R.J. Anderson proposed one possible trade target for the Royals to alleviate their outfield woes: Luis Robert Jr. of the Chicago White Sox.

"Robert Jr. was the most obvious trade candidate entering last season. His offensive performance has fallen off a cliff, however, owed to an increased whiff rate and -- this year, at last -- an unfortunate tendency to get too far underneath the ball, resulting in an unwieldy pop-up rate," Anderson wrote.

"Robert can still impact the game defensively and on the basepaths, and a team might chance it hoping they can help revert his offense to a better state. The White Sox will almost certainly have to fork over money as part of a trade, which isn't something that seemed likely even 18 months ago. Potential landing spots: Phillies, Braves, Royals."

Robert's volatile nature has been well-documented. He had a 38-homer, Silver Slugger season in 2023, and since then, he's been one of the worst qualified hitters in the game. But he has still been stealing bases and playing good defense in center. That puts him at 0.3 fWAR on the year.

If the power ever comes back, Robert could be a surprise upgrade for someone at the trade deadline. He's in the final year of that ill-fated $50 million extension, and the White Sox might be willing to pay down some of his $15 million salary to get a prospect back.

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