Star outfielder Brandon Nimmo revealed that he and his family just finished building a house in Port St. Lucie — the annual site of Mets spring training — before he was traded to the Rangers
The New York Mets traded Brandon Nimmo to the Texas Rangers on Sunday(Image: Getty Images)
Outfielder Brandon Nimmo conceded that his shocking trade to the Texas Rangers threw a major wrench in his life plans away from the baseball diamond.
On Sunday, the Mets — who recently risked angering Juan Soto after failing to bring back one of his favorite coaches — sent shockwaves across MLB upon dealing Nimmo to the Rangers in exchange for second baseman Marcus Semien.
The player swap came as quite a surprise to many across the league, chief among them Nimmo. The longest tenured player in New York’s clubhouse had spent the entirety of his 14-year career with the organization since being drafted in 2011, and inked an eight-year, $162 million contract in December 2022 that he believed would make him a Met for life.
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Speaking to reporters on Monday, Nimmo shed light on what led him to waive his no-trade clause — the final hurdle needing to be cleared in the deal sending him to Texas.
Given how much he and his family invested into their lives in New York and Port St. Lucie — the annual site of Mets spring training — Nimmo admitted that the decision required much thought.
“I tried to familiarize myself with the Rangers and where they were at, because this was going to be a huge, huge decision for me,” he explained. “Spring training is in Arizona. We live in Port St. Lucie, Florida.
“We just finished our house that we’ve been working on. And it was meant to host and it was meant to have spring training parties and team get-togethers. And so we had kind of built this life centered around [the idea] that we were going to be New York Mets until the very end.
Nimmo revealed that he and his family just built a house in Port St. Lucie(Image: Getty Images)
“And so there was a lot of logistical things that we had to try and get over those hurdles in order to try and make this make sense.”
At the end of the day, however, Nimmo stressed that the “personal stuff” took a backseat to what mattered most: winning. “The personal stuff, that’s all great,” he said, “but that’s not what it all means to me. I would honestly rather win a World Series.
“I needed to know that the Rangers were committed to trying to win a World Series. That this wasn’t a rebuild that I was coming into.
“That this was somewhere that I was extremely wanted and was somewhere that I felt like we would be competing for World Series titles, year in and year out.”
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Following lengthy conversations with Rangers president of baseball operations Chris Young and former teammate Jacob DeGrom, Nimmo — who slashed .262/.324/.436 with 25 home runs, 92 RBI, and 13 stolen bases in 2025 — concluded that his trade would be the best decision for all parties involved.
“The Mets would not have brought this trade if they didn’t feel like it put the Mets in the best position to win going forward,” he said. “They made it very apparent that they weren’t actively shopping me, but that the Rangers really, really, really wanted me.
“They made it extremely apparent. And they were persistent enough that they got to the point where a trade was to be had.”