Given a chance, Robles hits below .600 OPS, never walks, has no power, and hits a cool .200. There is no reason he should start or be anything other than an 8th inning defensive replacement. Even that is stretching things. His only skill is to chase down flyballs. Others can do that, and even hit .230. Why carry Robles on the 25-man roster?
He was 1.8 bWAR last year in 360 at bats. That factors in the defense. Lane Thomas was 1.6 bWAR with about 500 at bats. So even with less hitting and the baserunning gaffes he is considered a more valuable player. So the much better defense does matter at least to the people who do these analytics. If we had a really good option in CF then it would be different. As it is unless he breaks out offensively he will be gone by 2024. One last dance.
