Brandon Nimmo and his battles with health, approach and Father Time

Father time is undefeated. While we’ve seen players remain very good throughout their 30s, the vast majority of players perform significantly better in their 20s than they do in their 30s. And a player can lose it seemingly overnight once he’s on the wrong side of 30. The greybeards will remember George Foster, who in his age 27-32 seasons put up a combined .917 OPS and a 151 OPS+. At age 32, he had a 150 OPS+. And then he was traded to the Mets for his age-33 season and put up a 90 OPS+ and never got back anywhere close to what he did earlier.

Which brings us to Brandon Nimmo. In his age-28-30 seasons, Nimmo was remarkably consistent, putting up OPS+ numbers of 131, 130 and 128. But he dropped off considerably in his age-31 season, with a 108 OPS+. And this year has been a continuation of that downward spiral, as Nimmo has a 97 OPS+ after 52 games and 211 PA.

It’s easy to chalk up Nimmo’s decline to being on the wrong side of 30. But there are some extenuating circumstances to consider before we start to write his baseball epitaph. Nimmo had a solid first half in 2024 before experiencing terrible results the final three months of the season. He was dealing with plantar fasciitis (p.f.), although it’s unsure how much that contributed to his decline.

Then this season, while recovering from p.f., Nimmo experienced knee troubles during Spring Training. Recently, he missed some time dealing with a sore neck. Older players get hurt, so no one should give him a complete pass here for having injuries – it’s just something to keep in the back of your mind.

And then there’s the elephant in the room. Nimmo at one point was one of the ideal leadoff men in the game, due to his ability to work deep counts and post high walk rates. From 2017-2021, Nimmo had a .395 OBP in 1,615 PA. He also showed power in this stretch, with a .219 ISO in 2018 and a .204 mark in 2020, seasons where he didn’t have trips to the IL.

However, Nimmo has leaned into the power part of his game the past few seasons, posting a career-high with 24 HR in 2023 and following up with 23 HR last season, despite the second-half slide. It’s natural for batters to hit more homers as they age, as they tend to have a better understanding which pitches they can turn on for power.

Yet with Nimmo, it seemed even more than that. He talked about looking to cash in on RBI situations. His success driving in runners, along with a wish to jump-start Francisco Lindor in 2024, resulted in Nimmo dropping from leadoff to lower in the order. He batted anywhere from second to seventh a season ago, a trend that continued in 2025, with Nimmo batting mostly fourth thru sixth in the order.

As mentioned earlier, Nimmo wasn’t having much success with this switch to focusing on power, at least from a results POV. His “x” stats indicated that he was hitting into some really rotten luck. And then something a bit unexpected happened. Carlos Mendoza moved Nimmo to the second spot of the order with the series against the White Sox. And in those three games, Nimmo went 5-12 with 2 BB and only 1 K.

Was his luck finally starting to turn? Or did a move back to the top of the lineup result in Nimmo returning to the hitter he was earlier in his career? Of course, we’ll need to see a bigger sample to know for sure, one against better teams than the White Sox and Rockies, the upcoming opponent for the Mets.

Part of the appeal of Nimmo, at least for me, was his broad base of skills, where it was conceivable that he could post a rare .300/.400/.500 line – showing the ability to hit for average, a good eye at the plate and power, too. You could make the argument that Nimmo could sacrifice AVG for power and be a better player with a higher SLG.

The issue was that in addition to sacrificing AVG, Nimmo was also losing too much of his OBP. A .327 OBP like he had in 2024 was simply unacceptable. And it’s a woeful .289 so far this season.

In that 2017-21 stretch mentioned earlier, Nimmo had a 15.2 BB%. Compare that to 2025, when his 17 BB in 211 PA works out to an 8.1 BB%. My opinion is that it doesn’t make any difference if Nimmo is trying for base hits or homers – he’s not going to be the best version of himself until he gets back to working counts on a regular basis.

To be clear, working counts and hitting for power is not mutually exclusive for Nimmo. He can go to the plate looking for a specific pitch in a specific zone and attacking it if he gets it, even on the first pitch. Ideally, he can find a healthy balance between attacking early in the count and being patient enough to lay off pitches not where he wants them, even if that puts him in a hole. Nimmo’s knowledge of the strike zone and ability to foul off pitches to extend the at-bat allow him to compete, even when down in the count.

Whatever combination of health, luck and approach it takes, it will be great for the Mets if Nimmo can return to the player he was in the first three months of 2024, when he had an .824 OPS and a 136 wRC+ in his first 346 PA of the year. Nimmo had a 12.7 BB% in that span. It’s my belief that player is still there and that Father Time hasn’t won, yet.

My belief is that if goes back to working the count, along with results that match his contact, we’ll see a return of a valuable player, even if the AVG and SLG are different from what we got used to earlier with Nimmo. A .260/.380/.510 line from now until the rest of the season is something we’d all welcome.