The New York Mets have had a heavily consistent contributor on their roster in the form of Brandon Nimmo. Nimmo, for the last eight seasons now, has been a beacon of reliability down in New York, though if you look at the accolades, he’s got very little. Here’s to provide some insight into the hidden gem that people haven’t paid close enough attention to.
New York was able to retain Nimmo with an eight-year, $162 million contract extension at the end of the 2022 season, as they are under no illusions when it comes to his contributions to winning. What is interesting about his career is that he’s never once made it onto an All-Star team. This was once again true in 2024, even with outfielders not performing up to their usual standards this season. So, Nimmo is currently batting at a .252 batting average, surprisingly one of the lowest in his career, and his lowest since 2019. On paper, you might look at this and feel like it’s solid, but not great. The thing is that Nimmo is batting “about 30 percent better than the league-average hitter” and it’s a relatively down year for his standards. It’s still right in the ballpark of the batting numbers he’s had his entire career, yet not once has he been awarded for that consistency.
The lack of recognition in the form of accolades goes deeper than just being selected for an All-Star team. Nimmo has yet to win a Gold Glove or Silver Slugger award, he wasn’t even included for the NL Rookie of the Year award and has never received a Most Valuable Player vote. To put that last one into perspective, Most Valuable Player voting usually sees around 20 players per year getting at least one vote, and Nimmo hasn’t even been able to crack that list. You would think from accolades alone that he’s just a solid player, nothing outstanding. What you won’t see is that he’s posted two separate seasons where he had a 5-WAR. Statcast also states that he’s got +19 Outs Above Average for his entire career and is overall rated as a positive fielder. It’s honestly very surprising that Nimmo isn’t talked about even a little bit more.
Maybe you still think that this isn’t uncommon. Well, throughout history, when you factor in all of the other players that have received a type of award, selection to an All-Star team, or even a single ballot vote for Most Valuable Player, you’ll see that around 14,000 players are in that category. Nimmo, somehow, with his numbers, is left out. Players such as Jake Wood and Scot Thompson are on that list, and many might not even recognize their names. As for the WAR statistics, there is a list of the most career WAR that a player has without getting any type of award. This list started in 1947, and places Nimmo in third place with 25.3, just behind Bob Bailey at 31.3 and Rick Dempsey at 27.7. Both of those players played in the 1960s.
Now look, it isn’t all that surprising that he hasn’t won a Silver Slugger or a Gold Glove up to this point, though it is shocking that he’s not even been in the running for anything. Nimmo’s entire game is built on consistency as opposed to making flashy plays that garner attention. He’s also worked hard to be good at pretty much everything, while not being unbelievably good at just one specific thing. When you’re building a team to potentially try and win a World Series, Nimmo is the EXACT type of player that you want on the roster. His WAR in 2022 was at 5.5 and 4.2 in 2023, with him likely to be around that same mark in 2024 by the time this campaign comes to a close. When you combine those three seasons, you’ll see that he’s genuinely around one of the 15th most valuable position players that the league currently has to offer, even without doing anything spectacular.
Even taking a moment to dive back at and check the rest of the awards section, going back to the Minor League, there isn’t much to look at. He has won the Heart and Hustle award three separate times, which isn’t entirely surprising considering that it’s given to somebody who “embodies the values, spirit, and traditions of the game”. But the only other award on the list is a single Play of the Week honor. If you were to look at Nimmo’s career statistics without putting a face to them, you would believe that he has at least some type of accolade or MVP vote to his name, even if the vote was toward the lower end of the spectrum. However, you would be completely wrong.
There is growing hope right now that Nimmo can find a way to break this streak by the time this current season comes to a close. Many are hopeful that Nimmo will receive at least a single vote in the MVP ballot, even if it just throws him down at 10th place or something to that effect. Will this happen though? That is yet to be seen. With Nimmo, it’s become common to simply assume that he’ll be robbed of any recognition despite his best and most consistent efforts. Here’s to hoping that this entire narrative may change in the future and that Nimmo can get some awards/accolades that he’s rightfully earned, or at the very least, just get his name in the conversation.
The Mets know his worth, now it is time for the rest of the league to jump on board and figure the same thing out. With the current rate that we are going, it is very possible that Nimmo is able to earn the most career WAR without ever receiving any type of accolades or award placement since 1947, as we mentioned the leading player in the category, Bob Bailey, is above him by 5.
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