Benjamin Franklin once said that there are only two things certain in life – death and taxes. But if one of our nation’s most popular Founding Fathers were still around today, he would have added one more certain thing – Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen is going to get paid this off-season.

When the Dodgers waited until January 15, 2016 – the deadline for teams and players to exchange salary figures – to re-sign Jansen to his current one-year / $10.65 million contract to avoid salary arbitration, they very well may have dropped the ball – no pun intended.

By not offering the now 28-year-old Willemstad, Curacao native a multi-year contract extension, Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman and general manager Farhan Zaidi may have sealed their (and Jansen’s) fate by more or less forcing Jansen to test the waters when he becomes a free agent at the conclusion of the 2016 season instead of locking him down to a four or perhaps even a five-year contract extension – probably for something in the $11 to $12-million average annual value (AAV) range. And while it is generally understood and accepted that the financially prudent move is for a team to wait until they no longer have control over a player (i.e. free agency) before signing them to lengthy and expensive contract extensions, waiting to do so for the game’s premiere players (say… like… Kenley Jansen) tends to upset them and makes them feel that their talents are unappreciated.

Jansen was the last of six arbitration-eligible Dodgers to agree to a one-year deal this past off-season. And though his $10.62 million contract was the largest by a very wide margin, it pales in comparison to what he’s going to make next season … and beyond. (Photo credit – Ron Cervenka)

All Jansen has done in this, his walk year, is set a new all-time Dodgers franchise saves record, convert all but three of his 29 save opportunities and (finally) be named to an All-Star Game. In other words, that $11 to $12-million AAV is now “the floor,” as several rival executives recently put it.

No one will argue that Jansen’s one-year / $10.65 million contract for 2016 was a fair deal at the time, probably not even Jansen himself. In fact, it was actually very close to the one-year / $11.325 million contract that troubled free agent closer Aroldis Chapman eventually signed for with the New York Yankees – even while he was under suspension for violating MLB’s domestic violence policy. It was also (relatively) close to the $11.5 million AAV that closer David Robertson received from the White Sox for his four-year deal and the four-year / $42 million contract ($10.5 million AAV) with a $13 million option for a fifth year that premier closer Craig Kimbrel received from the Red Sox to make his deal worth a potential $58.5 million for an AAV of $11.7 million.

“This game is never going to run out of money,” Jansen told Orange County Register’s Bill Plunkett back on May 8, 2016, when the team was in Toronto for an interleague series against the Blue Jays. “I work for a multi-billion dollar corporation which is the Dodgers. There are 29 other teams that are part of a multi-billion dollar corporation that is Major League Baseball. It will take care of itself. I’m just going to do what I do.”

Has Jansen changed his stance on his pending free agency since that May 8 interview? Here’s what he told LA Times Dodgers beat writer Andy McCullough this past Monday.

“I really don’t care about [it],” Jansen said. “At the end of the day, the way I see it, I’m going to play somewhere, anywhere next year. It’s either with the Dodgers or not with the Dodgers. At the end of the day, if God helps me to stay healthy, I’m going to play this game that I love.”

Do you sense that ‘upset’ thing I was talking about?

And what does Andrew Friedman have to say about all of this? As expected, not much; certainly not enough to even remotely give the 6′-5″ – 270-pound gentle giant any incentive whatsoever to give the team that originally signed him any kind of a hometown discount.

“We don’t comment on specific negotiations,” Friedman said. “But our hope and expectation is that Kenley is in a Dodger uniform for a long time.”

One would think that if this is/was indeed Friedman’s and the Dodgers’ expectation, a deal would have already been struck back when Jansen’s price tag was considerably smaller than what it’s going to be the day after the 2016 World Series concludes and he officially becomes a free agent.

In all honesty, Jansen is not bitter, nor does he have a chip on his shoulder (unless you’re an opposing batter, that is). In fact, he absolutely loves being a Dodger – the team that signed him as an amateur free agent catcher in 2004. But in his seven major league seasons with the Dodgers, Jansen is 19-13 with an off-the-charts career ERA of 2.16. Heading into action on Friday evening Jansen has faced a grand total of 1,478 batters and struck out 579 of them; that’s 39.2 percent of them. Additionally, through seven big league seasons Jansen has converted 88 percent of his save opportunities. Soon-to-be Hall of Famers Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman both converted 89 percent of their save opportunities.

Yes… Kenley Jansen is going to get paid.

The only question is … by whom?