Former Houston Astros shortstop Carlos Correa has agreed to a 13-year contract for $350 million with the San Francisco Giants.

Correa's name was getting linked to the New York Mets as recently as Tuesday, making many Astros fans think he might be headed to New York to team up with former Astros ace Justin Verlander.

Instead, Correa decided to take the fourth-largest guarantee in MLB history with the Giants. Correa is only behind Mike Trout ($426.5M), Mookie Betts ($365M), and Aaron Judge ($360M). He is now the highest paid shortstop in baseball.

When looking at the 5-year $160 million deal he turned down from the Astros, Correa was right to wait for the big payday if securing the biggest shortstop contract was his primary goal, which clearly it was. You don't hire super agent Scott Boras to take a hometown discount. His plan to spend one year with the Minnesota Twins after the lockout slowed down free agency last season has clearly paid off.

Watching the Astros win the World Series with rookie Jeremy Pena playing in his place had to be tough to watch, but he has 350 million reasons to feel better about it now.

For the Astros, watching players leave and sign huge deals each offseason has become the norm. But the Astros have managed to find ways to overcome the losses and compete for championships every year. And unlike Gerrit Cole, at least George Springer, Verlander, and Correa didn't sign with the AL rival Yankees. NL teams are spending crazy money this offseason, just look at what's going on in the NL East.

Correa ripple effect

Coming off the Correa and Christian Vazquez news, Houston fans are patiently waiting for the Astros to address outfield, DH, and catcher, as Astros owner Jim Crane discussed at the Jose Abreu press conference. Perhaps we'll see free agency get ramped up, with several of the biggest names coming off the board.

The Astros could use a left-handed bat, and they may not be able to wait until March to find out if Michael Brantley is fully recovered from his shoulder injury. But as we've seen from these latest contracts, signing a player like Andrew Benintendi won't come cheap. Mets outfielder Brandon Nimmo signed an 8-year $162 million contract with the Mets recently. And Jim Crane may not be looking to make a commitment like that to an outfielder.

At the end of the day, handing out 13-year 350 million dollar contracts is just not how the Astros do business.

And that's one of the reasons they've been so successful for so long.