Don't look now: Phillies ideal deadline fit gets hot at the right time

The Luis Robert Jr. trade rumors have turned from your typical trade rumors into a complete saga. It's truly been a roller coaster season for his name in the trade market.

He began the season injured. The Chicago White Sox were horrible without him. He returned and instantly became one of the biggest names in the trade market, due to his Silver Slugger, 38 homer 2023 season in which he broke out incredibly. But following his injury, he struggled and the White Sox continued to be horrible.

The White Sox made it known that they were looking for a huge pakcage of high potential prospetcs in return for Robert. With his struggles and injury history, it wasn't too likely that Chicago would get their desired package, so the new idea was that Robert would just remain in Chicago until the offseason where he would then be dealt.

But Chicago's 26-year-old budding star is getting hot right now and teams like the Philadelphia Phillies could be back into the midseason sweepstakes.

Luis Robert trade market grows as the outfielder heats up

The Philadelphia Phillies and Atlanta Braves have each been interlinked with Robert ever since the idea that he could be traded came out. But the Phillies have long been looked at as the most likely destination for the Chicago star.

Robert is hitting just over .200 for the season, but his average doesn't tell the whole story at all. In fact, it barely tells a sliver of his season.

Every batted ball comes with an expected batting average based on the exit velocity and launch angle as well as past batted balls with similar metrics. This is where the Baseball Savant stat, xBA and xSLG come from.

Robert's xBA is nearly .20 points higher than his actual average, meaning he's getting unlucky on some of his hard-hit batted balls. Obviously this doesn't do anything for the past because an out is an out no matter how hard you hit it, but it does tell you that these balls should start landing. It's a good indication that his average should rise.

Robert also didn't get a full offseason and Spring Training due to being injured. This can explain his rise in K%, which will also come down 5-10 percent over the rest of the year. Once this number comes down, his other numbers will also rise more.

With all this being said, Robert is more than his batting average indicates. He's still among the league's best in slugging, Barrel%, sprint speed and a ton of other metrics. The Phillies know this. The Braves know this. If he can get hot and stay hot, the White Sox are more inclined to trade him and one of these NL East teams has a better chance to land his incredible services.