More Gibber From on High

White Sox general manager Rick Hahn has a problem on his hands, how to keep top-prospect Luis Robert in the minor leagues now that he’s hit 30 homeruns over three levels of competition this season.  But, hey, they don’t pay Hahn the big bucks to make impatient fans happy.

As quoted in Monday’s Tribune, Hahan said in something approximating conversational English that Robert’s stats “are showing you that they’re equal to and correlate with [!!!] what he’s capable of doing physically.  [But] There’s still going to be things he has to work on.” 

While admitting there are some players who make an easy jump from the minors to the majors, Hahn  took pains to point out how “there are some great ones here at the major-league level right now that have come to the big leagues and actually been sent back down, some of the greatest players in the game.  I speak of [Mike] Trout, for example, who was up and got sent back done and came back up” to become the player he now is.

Hahn’s verbiage probably left any and all sportswriters in the room too groggy to seize on the opening Mr. Gibber offered, that the Angels brought up a player without worrying about starting the service-time clock.  Trout came up at the age of 19 in 2011 to hit .220 in 123 at-bats.  But he learned something that more seasoning in the minors likely wouldn’t have given him.

Robert is three years older.  If Mike Trout was allowed to flounder a bit, why not the Sox prized prospect, Rick?  And, please, give us an answer in plain English.