What if the Mets signed Alex Rodriguez? Inside the big 2000 decision

In a weeklong series, The Post is looking at alternate realities in New York sports. We are examining “what if” scenarios for our teams, reversals of fortune that would have radically changed not only the franchises themselves but dramatically altered their leagues, too. There are two rules: The scenario must be grounded in reality and have taken place within the last 30 years. 

The Mets had just played their most significant games in 14 years when general manager Steve Phillips faced a potential addition problem that didn’t equate.

It was weeks after the historic Subway World Series between the Mets and Yankees in 2000, and the biggest free agent on the market was a 25-year-old shortstop who had grown up a Mets fan in Miami idolizing Keith Hernandez.

Alex Rodriguez was the premier baseball star on the planet, and the rightful expectation was he would receive the largest free-agent contract in baseball history. Phillips, who 2 ½ years earlier had helped bring Mike Piazza to town and then later negotiated a seven-year contract to keep the All-Star catcher, knew that signing Rodriguez was probably a long shot given his budget. But after a meeting with Rodriguez’s agent, Scott Boras, at the GM Meetings, during which financial parameters were not discussed, Phillips faced the math problem of 24 + 1.

Rodriguez’s requests, such as office space at Shea Stadium and a tent at spring training to sell his own A-Rod line of merchandising, would have created, from Phillips’ perspective, a clubhouse of 24 players and one Rodriguez. And that equation, to him, didn’t spell success.

“We were out before the money conversation ever happened,” Phillips said last week.

Rodriguez ultimately signed a 10-year contract worth $252 million with the Rangers. Phillips went about trying to bolster his roster in other areas, but after reaching the postseason in consecutive seasons for the first time in franchise history, the Mets were headed toward a decline. Mike Hampton departed through free agency, creating a rotation void the team couldn’t fill, and it wasn’t until 2006 — long after Phillips had departed — that the Mets were relevant again.

The question is: What if the Mets had signed Rodriguez? How would that single addition have potentially altered the franchise’s course?

“At the time when we were pursuing [Rodriguez], you could kind of dream about that lineup, and the offensive lineup would have been incredible,” said Jim Duquette, then the Mets assistant general manager. “He fit perfectly at least for the few years as a shortstop, because at that time it was before [Jose] Reyes had come on the scene so we didn’t have a shortstop where we could say he’s going to be our shortstop for the next 10 years.

“[Rey] Ordonez was easily replaceable. We had lost [John] Olerud and had [Todd] Zeile at first base and [Robin] Ventura at third and Edgardo [Alfonzo] at second, so we would have had a very veteran, albeit starting to age, infield. That whole building around impactful players, obviously A-Rod and Piazza were going to be the stars and they were the most recognizable. You want to talk about star power, it would have lifted our organization to a level we haven’t seen.”

On paper, at least, the Mets would have been formidable. But Phillips wonders how many pieces he would have needed to subtract to accommodate Rodriguez financially, even at a number substantially lower than $25 million per season. The best guess is the Mets might have been willing to offer $15 million-18 million per season for Rodriguez, but even that would have required Phillips to dump payroll. The Mets at the time were co-owned by Nelson Doubleday and Fred Wilpon, and big-ticket expenditures were rare. It was Doubleday who pushed the hardest two years earlier on re-signing Piazza for $91 million over seven years.

“We might have had to trade some pitching away to make [Rodriguez] fit the budget,” Phillips said. “It wasn’t as simple as add 18 or 19 or 20 million [dollars] into the budget and keep the same players. It would have been some level of subtraction in order to add him, because we weren’t going to add $20 million to the payroll as a separate line item. It was going to have to be, if not all of it, there was going to have to be some offset of taking some money off the books to make it work.”

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Bobby Valentine, the team’s manager at the time, said he sometimes wonders how the franchise’s course might have been different if the Mets acquired Rodriguez or Ichiro Suzuki, who departed Japan after the 2000 season and signed with the Mariners. The Mets submitted a posting bid on Suzuki, with Valentine — who had previously managed in Japan — leading the campaign to acquire the star outfielder.

Valentine, who was fired after the 2002 season, acknowledges Rodriguez’s addition would have brought challenges. But he believes the risk would have been worth it.

“We would have made the playoffs all those years,” Valentine said. “There would have been situations we had to deal with along the way, and the one situation I didn’t think was going to be a problem was that 24-and-1. I thought [Rodriguez] was different. I thought his agents were negotiating more deals than anybody we had in our place and I thought he would have that Jets locker room to himself for all that stuff, and I kind of liked it, because when he wasn’t using it I thought that I could use it.”

If the Mets signed Rodriguez, it’s possible Phillips would have avoided his largely disastrous roster overhaul following the 2001 season, in which he traded for aging stars Mo Vaughn and Roberto Alomar. The Mets also signed Jeromy Burnitz and Roger Cedeno, both of whom underperformed in their return to Queens.

The likelihood, according to Phillips, is Rodriguez would have remained at shortstop, giving the Mets an eventual infield that also included Jose Reyes at second base and David Wright at third. Phillips also doubts the Mets would have signed Carlos Beltran as a free agent before the 2005 season if they had Rodriguez.

Which, among Mets fans, might beg the question of whether Rodriguez would have fared better against the Cardinals’ Adam Wainwright in the ninth inning of Game 7 of the NLCS in 2006. Beltran took a called third strike on a Wainwright curveball to end the Mets’ season.

Also, if Rodriguez signed with the Mets, it’s possible he never would have played for the Yankees, who acquired him from the Rangers before the 2004 season to play third base, after Aaron Boone tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee during a pickup basketball game. Rodriguez later opted out from his original contract and re-signed in The Bronx. He was instrumental in helping the Yankees win the World Series in 2009, a title that might not have occurred if he had earlier signed with the Mets.

“It’s amazing, as I think about it, the dominos that occur,” Duquette said. “To be honest with you, there was no way we were going to spend $200 million, but if there had been a more reasonable conversation in the mid-100s, that would have been hard to say no to.”