NY Mets history rewritten: A bad Phillies contract replaces Brandon Nimmo instead

Brandon Nimmo was a lifelong New York Mets player until this offseason when he was abruptly traded away to the Texas Rangers. He signed an 8-year deal worth $162 million after an awesome 2022 campaign where Billy Eppler was willing to pay just about anyone who wanted to stay or join the club.

Years later, David Stearns had a different vision. No more long contracts with the exception of players like Juan Soto. Even his deal included a player option after five seasons which would give both player and team the power to move on from one another. Nimmo’s deal, on the other hand, was more typical and an expensive one for a never-been-All-Star player showing some signs of aging.

Stearns successfully (for better or worse) found a taker of the final 5 years of Nimmo’s contract. He wouldn’t have had such luck if the Mets ended up with a different plan in center field when one of their plans was to make Trea Turner their center fielder.

What do the Mets look like if they signed Trea Turner instead of Brandon Nimmo?

After winning a batting title in 2025, Turner is very much showing his age. He turns 33 on June 30 and looks every bit exhausted from the candles.

As large as Nimmo’s contract is, Turner’s reached 11 years and $300 million. Three years more and almost twice as expensive, the Phillies have been paying him to primarily be a shortstop. Never a Gold Glover, his defense is only one part of what has made him a player on a bad contract this season.

Around the league average in K% while remaining below so in BB%, Turner is profiling as less of a leadoff hitter and more of a bottom-of-the-order guy. He’s not old or unusable. If he was on the Mets though, there really wouldn’t be much of a place to play him. There’s no telling how the defense in center field would have gone. He hasn’t played that position since 2016 with the Washington Nationals. He seems destined to move away from there at some point. The fascinating thing about a life where he ended up with the Mets and didn’t play well defensively is that he probably would have gone to second base, the position the team filled by trading Nimmo away.

Turner remains a better player than Marcus Semien at this point of his career. However, it’s not farfetched to believe within three or four years how much worse he will be. We’ll give the Phillies four more full seasons after the current one of Turner being usable. There is still over $80 million and three years left of trying to figure out what to do with him. The thought of it would keep David Stearns up at night. Moving Turner, regardless of his performance, out of center field to clear space for players like Carson Benge and A.J. Ewing would be far easier to digest for most fans.

The Mets have their problems, both short-term and long. Place Turner on the roster starting in 2023 instead of Nimmo and things for both teams develop differently. There never is a Nimmo for Semien trade and yet Turner fully covers the goal of the trade on the depth chart, just not financially. He’ll get paid for three years beyond what Nimmo will receive and more money in each season. It’s a deal the Phillies made knowing how painful it would end up being by the end.

In Nimmo’s case, one of his more discussed suitors were the Colorado Rockies who are as close to a hometown club as the Wyoming native could find. Imagine him there, getting paid big dollars and putting up ridiculous offensive numbers for a losing ball club. Colorado has been pretty much silent in free agency since their ill-fated Kris Bryant signing.

The Nimmo the Mets got from 2023-2025 was different from the previous years. He turned into less of a leadoff hitter and more of a guy built to hit in the middle of the order. His OBP numbers fell off while the power increased. Neither contract is particularly friendly and the worst of it has yet to come for either player. Now only burdened with the last three years of Semien’s contract, the Mets escaped a financial problem in the future with the purpose of accidentally getting into a new one.

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