And Rodriguez, only 27, proved well worth the price, saving a record 62 games last season before entering the free-agent market in search of $75 million over five seasons -- he hoped from the Angels.
The Angels, after all, gave outfielder Torii Hunter $90 million for five seasons a year earlier. And they were about to offer Mark Teixeira $160 million for eight years.
But to Rodriguez they said no.
"They told me that I wasn't their priority. Their No. 1 priority was to sign Mark [Teixeira]," Rodriguez says. "When we tried to get back to them and see where we were, that's pretty much what they told us. I was in their plans, but right now their priority was to sign Tex."
A closer was a priority, though, for the Mets, who blew 29 saves and lost 19 one-run games in 2008, when they finished three games behind the NL East champion Philadelphia Phillies. But even the Mets weren't willing to guarantee Rodriguez all he wanted, offering three years and $37 million -- although that could grow by a year and $17.5 million with an option for 2012.
Rodriguez settled for that and the Angels replaced Rodriguez with free agent Brian Fuentes -- who will make $17.5 million over the next two seasons and has made the American League All-Star team while racking up 26 saves, tops in the majors this season.
"We were very upfront with Francisco. We told him what our position was," says Angels General Manager Tony Reagins, who confirmed that the Angels did not make Rodriguez an offer before he signed with the Mets last winter. "We told him [that] what we wanted to accomplish could take some time. He was a free agent and he had opportunities to explore.
"We had several attempts -- they were well-documented -- over the course of the last three years to come to an agreement. We were not able to do that. That happens."
Rodriguez's contract was the most lucrative free-agent deal signed by a reliever last winter. But while the process padded his bank account, it left him feeling empty inside.
"Before last year, I was seeing everything differently," he says, sitting before his locker at Citi Field, the Mets' new home. "Last year made me realize this is a business. When they took me to arbitration, and then made me go through a lot of processes. And then after the season they pretty much told me I wasn't their priority.
"So I realized that I was not, I guess, good enough to stay with them."
