10/6/22

Tom Brennan - REFLECTING BACK: My Feb. 2017 Prospect Write Up on Mets Star Brandon Nimmo

 I thought It would be fun to reflect back on my “prospect” take on current Mets stars who arrived and thrived. Here is Brandon Nimmo, Feb. 2017.



Tom Brennan - TOP 25 METS' PROSPECTS: #4 BRANDON NIMMO


Brandon Nimmo - Don't underestimate him.

I'll be honest, I was not too thrilled with Mr. Nimmo being a first round pick for the Mets in 2011.  I felt like dialing 911.

His minor league offensive results coming into 2016 were (let's be honest) mostly mediocre, albeit with good on base skills.  

Nothing in particular stood out.  Low power, mensa mensa speed.  But he was just 22 in 2015 and had suffered a few injuries since 2011 which slowed his progress a bit.  

Then the AAA season starts and Nimmo continued to reinforce my negative opinion by going 11 for his first 56, with barely any power (no homers and just 2 two baggers).  I was thinking, when are all those Barwis workouts going to pay off?

Then BAM...Nimmo started to rip, and in doing so, rip up my accumulating opinion of him as being a guy who talked a very positive game and did not deliver in kind.

I reconsidered, thinking he might just work out as a decent number 1 pick after all, when I saw him go 127 for 336 the rest of the way, a robust .378, with 42 extra base hits.  His time with the Mets was also modestly encouraging, hitting .274 but with just one double and a tape measure homer in 73 ABs.

Breaking his season's performance further, Nimmo hit better in Vegas (.387/.461/.571) but quite well on the road too (.326/.394/.518).  Good!

The lefty hitting Nimmo had a truly superb lefty/righty split in Vegas, hitting .358 in 120 at bats against lefties with a .567 slug %, and .349 against righties.  Great!

All things considered, he had one heck of a season.  

With the log jam in the Mets outfield, Nimmo may be ticketed back to Vegas for the earlier part of the season until the log jam eases.  If that were to occur, doubling his Vegas 2016 homer rate of 1 every 40 at bats to 1 every 20 couldn't hurt a bit.  If he spends considerable time in Vegas, I'd hope to see him hit .375/.450/.600 to further cement his readiness.

Nimmo has only stolen 37 of 67 in the minors, so his speed at first seems around average, but he has compiled a triple every 18 games in the minors, so it seems that once he gets his motor running, he can cover a lot of ground fast.

Defensively, he's been a competent CF with some limited experience in left and right field.

Overall, Nimmo seems

8 comments:

Mack Ade said...

told ya he would amount to nuthin

Mike Freire said...

Sandy caught a lot of crap for that pick, if I remember correctly.

In hindsight, it was a pretty good selection.........I hope they can retain him for 2023 and beyond. He is turning into a very good CF on top of his skills with the bat, etc.

Anonymous said...

I'm okay with bringing him back on a 2-3 year contract. Otherwise, no.

Anonymous said...

New phone. Supposed to be published under rds900.

Mike Freire said...

Well, he's going to be 30 years old in 2023 and by all accounts his defense is now considered a plus in CF. That, plus his usual contributions with the bat (high OB%, lots of runs scored) make him more valuable then you might think.

He put up 5 WAR this year (including an .800 OPS and a 130 OPS+), which is 28th overall in all of MLB, and fourth among CF'er (not much being Mike Trout's 6.3 WAR). Granted, he's not flashy, but I think he is better then anything we could reasonably replace him with in 2023.

It will be interesting to see what type of contract he ends up commanding........I think he could get as many as five years and it wouldn't shock me to see him get 20 million per year, give or take. Say 5 years and 100 million? Hell, I might be way off, but he's a valuable piece and he even played 151 games this year.

Mike Freire said...

"Behind Mike Trout"......stupid auto correct.

Tom Brennan said...

I'd give him at leas 4 years, $80MM. He's darned good. Career .385 on base, .441 slug - and he annoys the crap out of pitchers with his laser reading of the strike zone. Runners on base...

Mack Ade said...

I would promote Jake Magnum