White Sox center fielder Luis Robert 2nd in AL Rookie of the Year voting

Luis Robert

As expected, White Sox center fielder Luis Robert finished second in the 2020 American League Rookie of the Year voting.

Seattle outfielder Kyle Lewis won the award -- he was first on all 30 ballots. Robert received 27 second-place votes, and his name appeared on 29 of the 30 ballots.

Here is the side-by-side comparison of the two players:

Lewis: .262/.364/.437, 11 HRs, 3 2Bs, 28 RBIs, 5 SBs 

Robert: .233/.302/.436, 11 HRs, 12 2Bs, 31 RBIs, 9 SBs 

Lewis had the advantage in batting average and on-base percentage, and that clearly put him over the top in this race. If Robert had a case, it was his superior defense.

Robert was the AL Gold Glove award winner in center field and finished the season with a 3.4 defensive WAR, according to Fangraphs. By way of comparison, Lewis had a minus-0.9 defensive WAR, according to Fangraphs.

What hurt Robert most was his September slump, during which he went 11 for 81 with 32 strikeouts. The White Sox slid from first place down to third the last 10 days of the regular season, so that didn't help Robert's cause.

Worth noting -- and I didn't realize this until today -- but Lewis went 11 for 75 with 33 strikeouts in the September for the also-ran Mariners, so maybe Robert's late-season slide shouldn't have mattered so much. 

However, Lewis was batting .328 with a .945 OPS going into September, and that torrid first 35 games or so ultimately carried him to the award.