Free agent catcher Bengie Molina turned down all offers from the Mets and will return to the Giants.
An source with knowledge of the negotiations indicated the Mets’ final offer was one year for about $5 million with a vesting option. Molina, 35, instead took a one-year deal for $4.5 million guaranteed without an option.
“We feel that our offer was a very good offer,” Mets GM Omar Minaya said. “He may end up getting more in bonuses [from the Giants], but he was in a place where he likes it, and to get a player to go to another place, these things happen.”
Where do the Mets go from here?
“We’ll look at the market or possibly go with the guys that we have,” Minaya said, referring to Omir Santos, Henry Blanco and Josh Thole.
The free-agent catching market includes Yorvit Torrealba, with whom the Mets reached agreement following the 2007 season only to see the deal disintegrate because the team wasn’t happy with the results of his physical.
Torrealba has pending litigation with the Mets over that episode, but the catcher’s agent, Melvin Roman, told The Post his client would entertain an offer from Minaya.
“I am waiting for a phone call from the Mets,” Roman said, adding that Torrealba has no hard feelings toward the organization.
Torrealba expressed interest in the Mets to a Venezuelan Web site last week. He would join countryman Blanco on the roster.
“It would be a great experience to share with Henry (with) the Mets of New York,” Torrealba said in a translation of El Diario de Yaracuy.
A Mets official called it doubtful Torrealba will emerge as a candidate.
“We’ve got that lawsuit with this guy still,” the official said. “That would be weird.”
Minaya said the length of the negotiations with Molina didn’t make the catcher’s decision to re-sign with the Giants any more frustrating.
“We did the best we could to get him and we were not able to,” Minaya said. “But we’ll have to go to other plans that we have and we’ll have to find a way.”
The Mets could pursue veteran free-agent Rod Barajas, possibly the best available catcher in a thin crop.
*
The Mets had a representative in Louisiana to watch Ben Sheets audition in front of scouts and were impressed with reports they received on the right-hander. Sheets, who missed all of last season recovering from elbow surgery after starting the 2008 All-Star game for the Brewers, had his fastball at 91 mph.