Luis Robert Jr. created a indefensible red flag for trade suitors in White Sox loss

Luis Robert Jr. of the Chicago White Sox has been one of, if not the biggest name on the trade market this season. But, despite his stellar track record of performance, he has his major doubters. The two key pieces of his game that are pointed out are his low batting average and his high strikeout rate.

On a batting average front, the first thing to understand is that teams no longer weight batting average as heavily as they did in the past. They prefer stats like OPS, a stat which indicates the batters ability to slug and get on base. Robert's OPS is at a stellar .798 despite his .215 batting average. This means he gets on base a decent bit and he does damage when he does so.

For his strikeout rate, which sits at nearly 34 percent right now, it can be attributed to Robert's lack of a Spring Training due to injury. Yes, this rate is high, but it's slowly been coming back down, and it will slowly make its way down to the mid 20 percent range over the course of the season.

While it's easy to defend these baseball aspects of Robert's game, the one thing that even the biggest Robert Jr. fans can't defend is his lack of effort sometimes. This was highlighted at the end of the recent White Sox game.

Luis Robert Jr.'s lack of effort could deter potential trade suitors

To win in October, you need nine guys on the field that are willing to give it their all for the common goal of winning a World Series. It's a theme in nearly every World Series champion in history. A team acquiring Robert Jr. would be adding him to go after a World Series, yet he hasn't always shown that same drive to win games.

The Guardians would beat the White Sox on a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the ninth. A fly ball was hit to Robert Jr., maybe 300 feet from home plate, and he caught it, but never made a throw home. This let the runner score uncontested.

No, Robert Jr. didn't lose this game for the White Sox. In fact, his bat is one of the only reasons they were even in the game to begin with. But you have to make a throw there. It might not have gotten the runner, but it's disrespectful to his teammates to show that lack of effort with the game on the line. If the Guardians runner would have tripped or stumbled, only arriving safely because of the lack of throw, this is a completely different conversation.

Maybe this play can be attributed to frustration with how bad the White Sox are. Robert Jr. is beginning to play incredibly well and it's still not attributing to winning baseball. Maybe the 26-year-old is just frustrated and let it all show in the worst way possible. Hopefully it isn't a trend to how he is going to turn into as a ballplayer.