The Mariners are signing outfielder Víctor Robles, per Ty Dane Gonzalez of the Locked on Mariners podcast on X. The Mariners optioned Jonatan Clase earlier today, opening an active roster spot for Robles but they will need a corresponding move to open a 40-man spot.
Robles, 27, was once a top prospect with the Nationals but has repeatedly struggled in recent years, both with underwhelming performance and injury absences. The Nats finally decided to move on last week and designated him for assignment. They seemingly explored trades but couldn’t find a deal to their liking and eventually released Robles. The Nats remain on the hook for his $2.65MM salary, meaning the Mariners will only have to pay him the prorated portion of the $740K league minimum for any time spent on the roster, with that amount subtracted from what the Nats pay.
That makes it a fairly low-risk move for the Mariners, who will surely be hoping Robles can revert to his earlier career form. A few years ago, he was one of the top prospects in the whole league, with Baseball America giving him the #5 spot going into 2018 and the #11 slot the year after.
He seemed to be delivering on that prospect hype in 2019, when he was just 22 years old. He hit 17 home runs for the Nats that season and stole 28 bases while also providing elite defense in center field. FanGraphs considered him to be worth 3.7 wins above replacement that year and his strong performance helped the club reach the postseason, eventually winning the World Series.
Unfortunately, his performance slipped after that season and he hasn’t been able to get it back on track. He hit just .220/.293/.315 in the shortened 2020 season and produced fairly similar numbers in the two full seasons that followed, leading to a batting line of .216/.291/.306 over the 2020-22 period.
The fortunes of the club also faded in that time and the Nats entered a rebuilding phase. That should have left Robles with plenty of chances to turn things around but his health didn’t cooperate. He only got into 36 games last year due to back spasms in the lumbar spine and missed about a month of the current campaign due to a left hamstring strain. He managed to show some encouraging signs last year, hitting .299/.385/.364 despite the back problems, but has produced a brutal line of .120/.281/.120 so far this year.
Despite all the struggles, Robles is still young and could engineer a comeback. As mentioned, he was hitting okay last year. That didn’t carry over into this season, but he won’t maintain a .176 batting average on balls in play and it’s perhaps a good sign that he has drawn walks at a strong rate of 15.2% this year. That’s in a small sample of 33 plate appearances but it’s more than double his career rate of 6.2%, so it could be a nice step forward even if it regresses a bit.
The Mariners currently have an outfield/designated hitter mix consisting of Julio Rodríguez, Luke Raley, Dominic Canzone and Mitch Haniger. It’s possible that Robles will be utilized in the short side of a platoon. The right-handed hitter has slashed .262/.353/.373 against lefties and .226/.293/.349 against righties, leading to respective wRC+ counts of 101 and 72. Both Raley and Canzone are lefties with notable platoon splits. Raley has a 119 wRC+ against righties and 84 otherwise, with Canzone’s numbers at 86 against southpaws and 65 versus righties.
The M’s can use Robles to shield Raley and/or Canzone from some lefties while also perhaps using Robles for pinch running duties or as a late-game defensive replacement. For his part, Robles will get a chance to reinvent himself with a chance of scenery before he’s slated for free agency this winter.
How many light hitting center fielders do the Mariners need?
@Blackpink in the area
Since 2022 (~200 PA’s) he has a 111 wRC+ against LHP. He profiles pretty nicely as a weak side platoon.
Question is how much rope is Robles gonna get? I hope for the Ms to at least get a change of scenery bounce even if it’s just for a few weeks.
We all know that given the Astros’ struggles this year, Robles will have a mediocre summer and be the MVP of any series against the Astros… hopefully we don’t play each other much anymore this year.
They need someone to at least kinda hit LHPs sometimes since Raley and Canzone need platooning and Haniger is beyond washed up. Barring injury, Julio’s playing CF every day forever.
Chisholm has the 5th best OPS of all center fielders. Any guess what that is? It’s just 755. That’s top 5. For perspective, the 5th best OPS for SS is by Tovar at 811. Second Base is 767 which is Gorman. Centerfield is the weakest hitting position in baseball, right now during a season where offense is down across the board. There was no way someone wasn’t going to take a crack at unlocking the talent that others saw.
I’m not really trying to argue for Robles as a special talent he was once thought to be but I would have been perfectly fine if the Braves had decided to take a shot at that.
Editors note: Consider time stamp for difference in posted stats.
Dude calm down it was a joke.
As a Cardinals fan I would have been happy signing Robles. Get old man Carpenter off the team and at least maybe Robles provides some value. Robles is probably better than Siani.
Oh okay. I was getting pretty excited there. Throwing coffee mugs across the room, kicking puppies and stealing candy from babies and what not.
Oooooor maybe you should reconsider your delivery, I don’t know. Oh..sorry. You probably think I’m getting animated.
Dude it was a joke post you really didn’t need to reply with all those stats the way you did. I have nothing against Robles and wasn’t sharing my opinion on the signing it was a joke because Julio isn’t hitting. That’s all.
You didn’t catch the sarcasm, did you. Never mind. Go ahead and post one more time that it was a joke. I’ll let you have the last word. I won’t respond, I promise.
Sarcasm? Dude you replied with all those stats like we were having a serious discussion. Again it was a joke. A lot of people got it you didn’t apparently.
A lot of people also seemed to appreciate his stats, so I’m not sure anyone needs to calm down here. I think everything is fine and this conversation is fine.
Great Defense and solid speed whenever he gets on base (which doesn’t happen very much lately).
Doesn’t matter though, his base running instincts are garbage. And he’s prone to biffing on seriously routine defensive plays.
So pretty much an older Jonatan Clase.
C’mon Atkins, this was a layup, a break away on an empty net. What are you thinking!
He still has value as a 4th OF and defensive replacement, but I don’t think Seattle is the place to turn his offense around.
Robles is on his way to hit .050 and get released in two weeks
Remember when he was ranked ahead of Soto on all the top prospect lists?
Still has a much higher ceiling than Juan So-so
And as an added bonus, he doesn’t repeat the same lame insult on every single MLBTR comment thread.
he’s not good enough to make 2.65 mil, so he got cut. Now he will make 500k+ on top of the rest of the 2.65
God bless America
That’s not how that works at all. He makes 2.65 million with the Nats on the hook for what the Mariners don’t cover at signing.
“The Nats remain on the hook for his $2.65MM salary, meaning the Mariners will only have to pay him the prorated portion of the $740K league minimum for any time spent on the roster, with that amount subtracted from what the Nats pay.”
I am struggling to understand how you figure that the prorated portion of $740k would be made in addition to the $2.65 million.
He’ll struggle to hit, which means he’ll fit right in. Welcome to Seattle
Kinda surprised Cardinals didn’t pick him up to platoon with lefty Siani in CF. Guess they figure he’s same as Carlson but Carlson not hitting . Maybe Robles wouldn’t either but maybe a change of scenery will help
Yeah Edman isn’t progressing like he was supposed to Robles would have been a good fit. Team needs help against lefties.
Robles was Davey Martinez’ personal project for 5 years. He cut him slack when he ran the team out of innings (numerous times), he tried to get him to be more selective at the plate, he stuck with him through injury — always hoping his potential would be realized. The beginning of the end this year was when he — again — ran the team out of an inning and then dropped a routine fly ball. The pathetic BA was business as usual. He became a bigger bonehead the older he got! Five years ago, he hit 17 HRs and drove in 65 runs and played a great centerfield on a World Series winner. It was all downhill from there. Only a Mariner miracle can save him now.
Good luck to Victor Robles at his new gig.
On a different note I have muted someone on this site for the first time.
Could be a nice complement to Canzone vs LHP. Otherwise, a decent 4th outfielder/defensive replacement, and it allows Clase to develop more in the minors.
Braves?
Roble Roble
Maybe things will click for Robles like they did for Christian Pache last year when he landed in PHI. Of course, he had Kevin Long to work with, and the Mariners just fired their OC, so…………
Three years with Kevin Long didn’t seem to help Robles much in Washington.
.216 average fits right in! It’s better than half the team already…does he strikeout often too? Yippie
Lets go! He has a batting average over .200!
He’s only played in 15 games this year with just a handful of PAs facing LHPs, but last year he had a 10% BB, 7.5% K, and slashed .364/.447/.424 with a 146 wRC+ against southpaws.
I don’t know why some of you are overreacting to this like it’s something negative. Clase wasn’t helping and keeping him up to play once a week wasn’t helping him with his development. This is exactly the kind of moves teams make in June and it absolutely makes sense for Seattle.
Costs them nothing to possibly get better and it buys them time.
Exactly! Low risk move. Low cost. Fact is it would cost SEA an absolute fortune in prospects to swing a deal to get an impact hitter today. VR is in now way “an impact hitter” but he certainly has a chance to make an impact in another way-
SEA plays a ton of tight one run games. He should get a chance to turn his career around initially as a glove first defensive replacement. Could the M’s opponents for the next 6 weeks be a good soft landing for him to make an impact as a starter? Sure. Could he be DFA’d by the end of June? Ah….yes! Still a good move imo
Worth a flyer. Maybe he’s the proverbial player who needs a change of scenery, if he continues to suk then release em. Speed doesn’t slump.
Except in Robles’ case, it does. He runs himself into outs with unnerving regularity.
If he’d rob less he’d probably be an everyday big leaguer.
Robles was a great disappointment for us Nats fans, except when it really counted. Because he was an important part of our Championship team, I will only ever wish him well.
Why Not? I was hoping that the Mariners would swap out J. Clase for Cade Marlowe but this works. He is athletic, he is still very young, and if he is a good person in the clubhouse than “no harm, no foul.”
Cade Marlowe is hitting .219 in Triple-A this year — he’s struck out 86 times in 210 plate appearances – in the PCL! And you think he belongs on a Major League roster? WTF?
Clown em!
Are we seriously desperate enough to have the need to get the clown
His prospect status and the Nats 2019 season does a lot of heavy lifting when it comes to Robles. Truth is, he can’t hit but does offer a good defense. In fact I’m sure that’s the reason he stuck around in Washington for as long as he did. He also doesn’t steal bases despite having above average speed. Best of luck to the guy.
Geeeeeez, they think this change of scenery will, what, IMPROVE his offense? The M’s are where good offensive players go to… become marginal at best. And Robles ain’t good.
Is Kyle Lewis really so far down the food chain now that we don’t think about him before making a move like this?
I remember that when both Robles and Juan Soto were coming up through the Nats system that Robles was considered to be the better prospect.
Kyle Lewis was traded by the Mariners to the Diamondbacks for Cooper Hummel in November 2022.