Rafael Antoni Furcal gained popularity while steadily performing well after winning the National Baseball League Rookie Award in 2000. When his contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers expired in 2008, there was a fierce competition among the clubs to recruit him. The Atlanta Braves tried to persuade him the most with a high-salary offer, saying that there were many of his former colleagues in the team since it was his first Major League Baseball club. They hastily announced his return on the media.
However, Furcal decided to renew his contract with the Los Angeles Dodgers, who offered a lower salary than the Braves. It was none other than a used fire truck that caught his heart. Furcal was born in a small village in the Dominican Republic. Even after becoming a successful man in the United States, he always worried about his hometown. Whenever his hometown folks were ill, he would willingly pay their medical expenses. He felt sorry about the fact that the firefighting facilities in his hometown were only able to afford to put out a fire with a bucket of water in the truck. The Dodgers owner remembered this and promised to send a fire truck to his hometown. Furcal said, “I felt that the Dodgers sincerely cared about me and my hometown.”
It seems that there is no greater bargaining card than truly caring about what the other person values.