The Mets spent a large chunk of the offseason entertaining the possibility of signing George Springer, and they've also been linked to Jackie Bradley Jr., who remains on the free agent market.
But all along, Brandon Nimmo has been preparing to play center field. And he did his best to tune out the noise.
"I did hear about it. I tried to not pay attention too much," Nimmo said via Zoom on Thursday about the rumors. "I wanted to try and get the feedback from Luis (Rojas) and Sandy (Alderson) and Zack (Scott) and their message hadn't changed from 'you're our center fielder until otherwise.' And so as far as that goes, I tried to just keep preparing for center field.
"There definitely was a lot of talk going on, and I always welcome the thought of another great player. ... If someone pushes me out of center field, they're a pretty dang good center fielder, so then I feel good about playing corner (outfield) or something like that."
Nimmo has been told by team brass that he is the center fielder as of now. And while that could change if the NL adds the designated hitter -- which would give the Mets the option to slide Nimmo to left and use Dominic Smith or Pete Alonso at DH -- Nimmo has been getting ready for center.
And with Nimmo's defense in center field needing improvement, he's been working on shoring it up, using information from the team that he started putting to use late last season.
"I've been getting ready this whole offseason for center field. And yeah there's definitely things that I need to work on and that I'm gonna continue to work on," Nimmo explained. "I think playing depth is one of those things that they outlined in the analytics. There's other things in the analytics that we can highlight and we can go after. I think that's one big thing that will help me.
"I'm trying to convey to everyone here -- and we've had mutual conversations about it -- that I can play center field, I can do it well. There's definitely some things to improve upon. If there's one person that can make adjustments, I think it's me. ... I take it as a challenge to be a better defender and be a better leader out there."
Speaking specifically about why his defense in center has been graded poorly when it comes to analytics, Nimmo said he's zeroing in on a few specific fixes.
"I think early on in the season (in 2020), I think honestly I was playing too shallow," he said. "And so that was keeping me from catching a lot of balls I think the metrics would say are very catchable balls. That was something we tried to improve on at the end. There was definitely a couple of balls that I just screwed up on. And in 60 games, that's gonna be highlighted. You're not gonna have the longevity to make that up."
In addition to his positioning, which he started to adjust late last season, Nimmo is working on his first step quickness.
"I noticed a difference when we made that adjustment right away," Nimmo said about his positioning. "Definitely was able to play more balls and be able to play the wall a lot easier, a lot better. And then coming in on balls is a strong suit of mine as far as just being able to haul in, rather than going back."