A few news updates to get you through your Monday, beginning with Johan Santana …

Assuming Johan can come back from his season-ending injury, he will return to Minnesota next April.

MetsToday reader “Andy” sent me this email:

Joe,

I’d love to see your take on the millions of dollars K-Rod lost so that Scott Boras could have his cut on his next contract. Looks like $5.5M less for K-Rod and $800,000 more for Boras, right?

Funny, Francisco Rodriguez became

Anthony Di Como is reporting that the Mets may be “in the running” for reliever Octavio Dotel.

If so, they’re at least a year too late — and probably, still a dollar too short.

From time to time during this offseason, we’re going to randomly look back at some MetsToday posts from the past and see how they look now, with the benefit of hindsight.

To start, I offer you this suggestion made in early February 2011: Would You Trade for Michael Young?

At the time, the Rangers had Young on the trading block — even offering him to the rival Angels. My wild idea was to offer Carlos Beltran and Francisco Rodriguez — or Jason Bay straight-up — in return for Young. Granted, I have no idea whether Texas would have accepted either of those offers, but to me they could have made sense for both clubs.

Of course, I had no idea that Young would wind up hitting nearly .340; to me, it would be a good deal for the Mets because it would dump two big contracts while also providing middle-infield insurance through 2013 — in case, ahem, Jose Reyes would be departing.

Look back at that article again, including the spirited comments, and come back here to discuss what might have been.

In case you missed it, former Mets closer and current Brewers setup man Francisco Rodriguez (a.k.a., “K-Rod”) is unhappy in his current role.

Huh.

It seems that Mr. Rodriguez is dissatisfied with being “just” a setup man on a first-place team bound for the playoffs.

Perhaps he’d prefer to be a closer on a team that is 7 games under .500, 25 games out of first, has been mathematically eliminated from the postseason in the second week of September, and on the verge of sinking to fourth place? After all, winning isn’t everything.

From the Milwaukee Sentinel:

In case you missed it, the Mets completed their trade with the Brewers — the one that sent Francisco Rodriguez to Milwuakee. In for K-Rod, the Mets received two pitchers who did not fit into the plans of the Brewers, nor the teams they were with immediately prior. But that doesn’t mean they can’t fit into the Mets plans.

Before we discuss the two hurlers the Mets received, it may be fun to look at some of the names thrown around in the comments section of the July post announcing K-Rod’s departure, and in the story and comments of Dan Capwell’s PTBNL article. Seems we all were way off, because the two players the Mets received were

With 8 weeks left in the regular season, reality is settling in like a haze around Citi Field.  After losing 5 in a row, the Mets appear to have finally run out of magic.

But what does the blogosphere think?:

• Real Dirty Mets has a real dirty look at the problems that face Sandy Alderson
• Faith and Fear wishes Jason Bay were as good at hitting home runs as he is at swatting hope out of the park.
• Amazin’ Avenue has his weekly player performance meter.  Why are there so many red arrows?
• Metstradamus talks about…well, never mind that.  I just LOVE this picture of Mike Pelfrey.
• Mets 360 examines the Minayariffic signing of D.J. Carrasco by new GM, Sandy Alderson.
• Tedquarters says Pelfrey’s recent quotes about the Mets were simply a reflection of reality.

As they say in baseball, hang with ’em.  And keep hangin’ at Mets Today.

Prior to being traded, Francisco Rodriguez made it known to Terry Collins that he wanted to eliminate the $17.5 vesting option in his contract. Rodriguez, according to the NY Times, felt it was interfering with how the Mets were using him as a closer. In a non save situation a few weeks prior to the trade, K-Rod began warming up, expecting to be brought into the game, and was upset with the implication that the Mets had not used him to avoid activation the vesting option.

A deal between the Mets and Rodriguez could not be worked out, but Alderson was able to convey to other teams that Rodriguez would be willing to forgo the option, making it much easier for the Mets to trade him.

The Mets completed a deal within 48 hours. In the next few days, Rodriguez agreed to restructure his contract, taking out the vesting clause and making the option a mutual one. Rodriguez was also paid an additional $500,000.

Part of Rodriguez’s motivation for getting rid of the option was that, at 29, he can probably get more total money with a longer contract after this season.

K-Rod also switched agents in the middle of trade talks to Scott Boras.

Since the trade, K-Rod has not finished any games for the Brewers but has been the eighth inning set up man for John Axford.