Twins owner Joe Pohlad, grandson of longtime owner Carl Pohlad and nephew of successor Jim Pohlad, announced that his family will begin exploring a sale of the team. The Pohlad family has owned the Twins since 1984 — the third-longest tenure of any ownership group in the sport behind only the Steinbrenner family (Yankees) and Jerry Reinsdorf (White Sox).
“For the past 40 seasons, the Minnesota Twins have been part of our family’s heart and soul,” Pohlad said in this morning’s press release. “This team is woven into the fabric of our lives, and the Twins community has become an extension of our family. The staff, the players, and most importantly, you, the fans — everyone who makes up this unbelievable organization — is part of that. We’ve never taken lightly the privilege of being stewards of this franchise. However, after months of thoughtful consideration, our family reached a decision this summer to explore selling the Twins. As we enter the next phase of this process, the time is right to make this decision public.
We truly respect and cherish what the Twins mean to Minneapolis, St. Paul, the great state of Minnesota, and this entire region. Our goal is to be as informative as possible with the team, staff, and you, the fans. You deserve that, because in so many ways, this team doesn’t belong to any one family – it belongs to all of you. It’s our objective to find an ownership group who all of us can be proud of and who will take care of the Minnesota Twins.
After four decades of commitment, passion, and countless memories, we are looking toward the future with care and intention – for our family, the Twins organization, and this community we love so much.”
Carl Pohlad purchased the Twins franchise from former owner Calvin Griffith for a purchase price of $44MM back in 1984. Three generations of the family have since spearheaded ownership, with the 42-year-old Joe Pohlad being tabbed as the team’s control person just two years ago. It’s impossible to know precisely how much the Twins might fetch in a sale, but it’ll surely top $1 billion. The Royals ($1 billion), Marlins ($1.2 billion) and Orioles ($1.725 billion) commanded at least that much in their sales within the past half decade. Entering the season, Forbes placed an estimated $1.46 billion value on the Twins — a five percent increase over the prior year.
For a frustrated Twins fanbase, it’s surely welcome news. Ownership drew the ire of Minnesota fans by slashing $30MM off the payroll on the heels of the team’s first postseason series win since 2002 just this past offseason. Uncertainty surrounding the television broadcast rights in the midst of Diamond Sports Group’s ongoing bankruptcy proceedings largely fueled that decision, but it was nevertheless a disheartening trajectory for a fanbase that has long voiced frustration with ownership even before that reduction in budget.
The Twins have long resided in the bottom half and frequently the bottom third of Major League Baseball in terms of player payroll. Fans were sold hope that the construction of Target Field, which opened in 2010, would boost spending capacity. It’s technically true that the team’s payroll has risen, but only relative to their prior spending levels and not relative to the rest of the league. The Twins haven’t ranked in the top half of the league in payroll size since 2012, and this past season’s 18th-ranked payroll falls right in line with the same levels they sat at the Metrodome in 2003-09, when their payroll ranked between 18th and 25th in the sport each season (per Cot’s Contracts).
It bears emphasizing that exploring a sale and committing to a sale are not one and the same. Angels owner Arte Moreno and Nationals owner Mark Lerner have both explored the possibility of selling their own clubs in the past two to three years, only to eventually express a change in direction and intent to continue on as the owners of those respective teams. Both of those clubs were purchased by current ownership far more recently, however, and play in much larger markets. That meant loftier sale prices and less potential for return on investment than the Pohlad family stands to make in soliciting bids on a small-market club that was purchased four decades ago for a price smaller than the combined salary of the Twins’ two most-expensive players (Carlos Correa and Pablo Lopez).
For now, the prospect of a sale surely instills a sense of hope in fans but also creates more questions than answers. It’s unclear whether the Twins are wholly committed to selling or simply seeing what the franchise might fetch, nor is it presently known what price they’ll seek or if there’s any sort of deadline after which they’ll stop fielding interest. On a smaller scale, it’s difficult to glean just what a sale of the club might mean for the 2025 roster and payroll. Joe Pohlad had already publicly stated that he did not anticipate further reduction in payroll, though that was before the sale of the club was made public.
It’s also possible, though far from certain, that news of the impending sale process prompted now-former general manager Thad Levine — the team’s No. 2 baseball operations executive behind president of baseball operations Derek Falvey — to step down and seek new opportunities. Levine announced his departure from the club just last week. He did not cite a reason for his decision, but Levine has spoken fondly of the Pohlad family in the past and turned down interview opportunities to interview as a baseball operation leader with other organizations, including the Mets and Phillies. The Rockies were also linked to him before sticking with an internal name and elevating scouting director Bill Schmidt to the GM’s chair. Levine did interview for the Red Sox’ front office vacancy one year ago, but the Sox ultimately hired former Cubs assistant GM Craig Breslow.
horaceallen
Hopefully the new owners will commit to more spending.
Samuel
Yawn
Human Being
@Samuel Good idea. Eric Yaun, the billionaire at Zoom, could buy them.
tangerinepony
Considering that they’re a small market team I wouldn’t hold your breath that they’ll increase spending. How’s that contract they gave to Correa or even Buxton turning out ?
Aiden Awe
Minnesota is a mid market city.
mang
Yes, the City of Minnesota is large.
Gwynning
It’s almost as big as the city of Montana, mang!
slider32
Yep, bought the team for 44 million and now sell for 1.4 billion.
Redwood13
44 million 40 years ago = 1.4 million down + interest
bkbk
Living the Angels fan’s dream
DirtyWater04
Correa posted 4.3 WAR this year, so his production value was pretty much exactly equal to what they paid him. Not his fault they thought they could win with a AA pitching staff.
WAR_OVERRATED
baseball-reference.com/players/c/correca01.shtml
The overrated Carlos WAR in just 3.7 in a small sample of 86 games and 319 at bat. That’s why that Metric is worthless. Carlos defensive skill and reliability is also close to average os less. He’s going down hills and expect less production as he gets older. WAR is a poor Metric to be used as a cristal ball with a player with a cristal body.
kevnames42
If you’re going to use it as part of your argument, learn how to spell crystal
BaseballisLife
The value of 4.3 bWAR is $39.775 million. What was Correa’s salary in 2024?
outinleftfield
Tangerine, Minneapolis-St Paul is a mid-market metro area. 15th largest TV market and 16th largest metro area in population in MLB.
Col_chestbridge
Outinleft, that’s true but consider that 2 teams each play in Chicago, NY, and LA. The Twins spend pretty much equal to their station in MLB.
MLB needs more equal revenue distribution to fix this. That comes from the owners and nobody else.
Lanidrac
MLB already has revenue sharing. However, they can’t make it significantly larger without a consolidated TV deal like the NFL has, but such a thing would be impossible to design with MLB’s schedule of playing almost every day and often needing to broadcast 15 games in a single day.
larkraxm
There is nothing to fix. Many teams do not even spend what they get in revenue sharing on payroll. If you are an owner that is being oppressed by MLB, then sell your team. Cleveland, Detroit, Milwaukee, and Kansas City all somehow “lucked” their way into the playoffs under this broken system.
DirtyWater04
Lack of resources isn’t exactly the Twins’ problem. The Pohlads are sitting on a fortune – estimated to be close to $4 billion 10 years ago. As of 2015 the Twins were estimated to be worth just shy of $900 million. I haven’t seen a more current estimate of their net worth but it illustrates the point that this is not an ownership group whose balance sheet consists of the franchise and nothing else. They have plenty of money from their many successful businesses that they could absolutely afford to steer towards greenlighting higher payroll spending, and choose not to. That’s their prerogative if they aren’t willing to put more money in, but I’m not going to sit here and listen to them cry poverty about it also. It’s an active choice they’ve made, not an imposed constraint.
larkraxm
I wonder how much this “small market” team will sell for. I’m sure the poor Pohlad family will take a loss on this sale. I feel so sorry for billionaires.
lowtalker1
Or maybe they want to relocate the team back home so Montreal can get their team back
kleppy12
The twins franchise was never in Montreal
lowtalker1
Your insight and reading skills are lacking. Twins are from dc you knuckle dragger
Nationals are from Montreal.
NYCityRiddler
Knuckle dragger, I gotta work that into the repertoire. Maybe a little doubleheader action, that along with a sprinkling of knuckle head has winner written all over it. Please stand by. Ahahahaha!
prov356
lowtalker1 – “Or maybe they want to relocate the team back home so Montreal can get their team back”
I understand what you said but that was a horribly constructed and misleading sentence.
darkknight920
Knuckle dragger is a good one.
Flyby
“Or maybe they want to relocate the team back home so Montreal can get their team back”
Your remedial sentence formation and command of the language is near caveman level. Congratulations as it is probably an improvement
Maybe you can be a CBS reporter? 🙂 .
ActionDan
What are you talking about “back home to Montreal”? The Twins were never in Montreal. The Twins relocated from Washington DC where they were the original Washington Nationals/Senators.
BaseballisLife
Not sure the Nats want to give up that DC market for Quebec.
seamaholic 2
The Twins are pretty near their red line I imagine. Owners do not subsidize franchises from their own pocket and the infinite revenue that fans tend to assume is just fantasy.
StudWinfield
I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for Santa Claus to own your favorite team.
mlb fan
“More spending”…You think of that one yourself?…I ask only because it’s so “original” and well thought out.
Ignorant Son-of-a-b
What they invested: 44 million. What it’s worth (approx): $1.4 billion. I guess it takes money to make money. Does an every day Joe Blow ever have the opportunity to make $1,356,000,000 in appreciation over 40 years??
StudWinfield
Is the every day Joe Blow capable of building the wealth from nothing that Carl Pohlad did? Probably not.
Ignorant Son-of-a-b
How about just equalling the growth rate of the money?
Put John Sterling in Sarco Pod ASAP
@stud. Sorry we all didn’t get the chance to start our businesses foreclosing farms during the Great Depression.
He didn’t build his wealth from nothing. He used the wealth he had to destroy what others built up.
That Carl Pohlad, a real go-getter we should strive to emulate.
outinleftfield
I love what Wiki has to say about him. Don’t know if its true, in fact I am pretty sure its not since he graduated high school in 1934, but its funny.
“Pohlad got his start in the banking business by foreclosing farms during the Great Depression”
Put John Sterling in Sarco Pod ASAP
What about his mob connections in Minnesota that forced the destruction of the rail line. You can see from Wikipedia he was in charge of the transit lines. Made a deal with mobsters that had supplier ties to city buses for tires and parts. Tore up the rail lines moved to buses
Put John Sterling in Sarco Pod ASAP
Also everything happened after he served in ww2 so the whole timeline actually makes sense. In fact I’m pretty sure it’s all true. It’s not funny, it’s the story of a scumbag.
StudWinfield
One may find the industry he succeeded in unsavory but it wasn’t his or the farmer’s fault that Europe destroyed the gold standard in WW1. The movement of capital isn’t always pretty regardless of what economic philosophy you prefer.
GO1962
The Wiki claim is that Grandpa Pohlad made a fortune foreclosing farms during the Great Depression, while the current Minnesota sports fan makes the claim that Grandson Pohlad is making a fortune foreclosing on the hearts of the fans..
outinleftfield
If you invested $1 million in Microsoft in 1986, based on historical stock price data, your investment would be worth approximately $500 million today, assuming you reinvested all dividends. Multiply that times 44.
Put John Sterling in Sarco Pod ASAP
Who had $1 million in 1986? And $1 million to invest in one single stock?
Maybe you need a new helmet?
outinleftfield
I invested more than $1 million in one Manitowoc crawler lattice boom crane in 1986.
Ignorant Son-of-a-b
Was that a good thing or a bad thing? I’m not conversant in large machinery or construction equipment, if that’s indeed what the Manitowac crane might be.
stymeedone
It’s only money on paper until they actually sell it.
Redwood13
If you invested 44 million 40 years ago you would have a lot more then 1.4 billion.
ThatsIT?
Hopefully the new owner has a low budget in mind just to illustrate that spending doesn’t equal winning and to remind those fans that the current owner wasn’t bad at all and spent too much.
Aoe3
With inflation and growing of the sport the price tag will be high to just purchase them. That will probably result in the same mediocre spending. MIN ranks 23rd in attendance for 2024.
ckc12537
inflation is normalizing btw
Pads Fans
Sports team inflation?
baseballpurist
Inflation isn’t normalizing, Joe.
ckc12537
What makes you believe that it’s not?
Manfred Rob's Earth Band
What makes you believe that it is?
Pads Fans
Inflation is currently below the 40 year and 80 year averages today and has been throughout 2024.
I remember 13.5% inflation, 20.5% interest rates, 9.7% unemployment, and 1.7% GDP under Reagan.
ckc12537
Do you have a master’s degree in economics or do you just troll people when you know your opinion is wrong?
ckc12537
Unfortunately for us, very few Americans understand basic economics.
Manfred Rob's Earth Band
Do you have a master’s degree in economics or do you just troll people when you know your opinion is wrong?
ckc12537
I have a master’s degree. I know I’m not wrong.
ThatsIT?
Just because you have a masters degree in something doesn’t make you correct.
The guy that cut me off in a road rage incident last week mentioned he had a masters degree too. Hopefully his masters degree will ease his headache after he got clocked. By way he was wrong and owes me money according to the insurance company and police.
ckc12537
Um, knowing that inflation is normalizing isn’t debatable. It isn’t my fault that 95% of Americans are economically ignorant.
Pads Fans
Minneapolis St Paul ranks 15th in size of media market. They are a mid market club.
Since every team sold in the last couple of decades has sold for more than the value placed on the team by Forbes, I am going to go out on a pretty thick limb and say the Twins will sell for just under $2 billion.
ForDoingNothing
Twins were 23rd in attendance because the owners put in the effort that they did. If ownership doesn’t care, why would the fans?
outinleftfield
Down the 5 from here the owners of that team showed that if you put in the money and effort you can draw fans. I think I read that they drew 3.4 million and averaged 42k this season in San Diego.
Twins fans seem to be pretty passionate. Do you think they could draw like that?
Frenchredsox
Owners pay the players,staff and maintained a MLB club in Minnesota – yes it’s the 15th this and 16th that but there were and are still other areas which could have been more profitable . Just for this fact alone they deserve some respect. On the performance side ? That’s another problem and issue and undoubtedly they could have drafted better and achieved greater success. New ownership may be better at it .
Pads Fans
The Padres are a great example of growing a team’s revenue stream while their media and population stayed stagnant as one of the smallest in baseball. 30th largest TV market and 8th in population. They went from a consistently bottom of MLB revenue team that received both a CBT pick and a revenue sharing check to being a revenue paying team the last couple of seasons.
matthewruske
PLEASE let this happen.
HopefulTwinsFan
LET’S GO. It needs to happen. Twins fans NEED this after a season of hearing that the team wouldn’t acquire good players unless it meant offloading existing spending. Hopefully, new owners will spend more and commit to keeping the team where it is.
stymeedone
Which aging FA would you like them to purchase? You know that the better the player, the longer yoh will be stuck with them, and the more you will pay them in their decline. How do you want your albatross served?
HopefulTwinsFan
Spending more doesn’t always mean handing out albatross contracts to washed up players. It could mean acquiring good players via trade and taking on their salaries. The Pohlads were one of the richest owners in baseball and still penny pinched when it came to offering contracts or acquiring seasoned players. Paying a player is always a risk but there is reward involved, too.
Texas Outlaw
New owners will most likely mean higher ticket prices.
benhen77
That’s not how economics works.
CardsFan57
Given the falling revenues, I expect team valuations in smaller markets to drop instead of rising.
Samuel
What falling revenues?
The Bally bankruptcy is temporary.
CardsFan57
The loss of the ability to charge non-fans for local TV rights is not temporary. The RSNs altered the economics of the sport in huge way. The fall of the RSNs are also going to alter the economics of the sport in a huge way, especially in smaller markets.
proton
MLB will be broadcasting certain teams. What that really means is Apple or Paramount will be broadcasting the games. You will have to pay another fee to watch just like MLS. Why do you think Stanton (Ms) would not broadcast on his own station?
This is the way of sports. Will be interesting to see what happens with the YES Network. How big of a fight does it put up? Or does Steinbrenner see the dollar signs and dump it for more money? Streaming sports isn’t the way of the future it is here and leagues are trying to figure out how to get every team on board.
MLB uses these teams as a trial run to see how fans react then go head long into the dark. Don’t say you won’t pay to see your team play. You are lying to yourself. Heck MLB could just make all games through their app only and make more money. Depends on what they can sell games for. MSL got $2.5 billion for 10 years. BB will eclipse that easily. Triple it or more. They also will sign for shorter terms. Who knows what will be in 5 years.
Samuel
proton;
Agree.
Wrote about it yesterday. Cable is dying. Streaming is the way to go for everything now (have been in crypto for years because it’s the same principle – e.g. do you have an internet connection somewhere in the world?).
Competition will make streaming cheaper, not more expensive. I pay less to watch parts of 5 games a day on MLB.TV (streaming) than most people here do on cable…..and I can replay any game at my convenience 365 days a year.
All the people above rapping me are wrong. It’s RSN’s that are a rip off.
Worried that old people want to watch on their TV’s? What, like they don’t have computers – or which they can buy an attachment for $25-50 that will allow then to display on a large screen.
TV’s are as dead as cable.
Again, this is how MLB is going to square away the outrageous revenue differences that large market teams get over mid and small market teams. They can keep their radio rights. Same as the NFL and NBA. It’s coming.
proton
I have been saying this before MLS went to Apple. When the NFL started playing games pay TV saw it coming.
I am old and am in the midst of switching. My son and I are going to figure out which service we to use. Looks like either FUBO or YouTube. I just downgraded my Xfinity package. My contract expired and my bill was $345 a month. They do this with phone that you have to have to get a package. When that package expires charge you $45 a month for something you forgot you had. I am also trying Xfinity stream but that will not be the final one. Internet will be the next to change. It is over $100. Crazy
Samuel
proton;
I’m not asking, but I have no idea what you’re watching that would cause me to pay $345 a month…let alone anything else.
Am retired. Spend at least 2 hours a day in an exercise club 3 times a week. Often bicycle an hour over hills to get there. At home do Stretching (mostly Yoga exercises) and Floorwork an hour or so a day 3 other days a week. Have switched to a metabolic diet after talking to friends, watching You Tube videos, and reading a lot about it. In fact, other than watching baseball, seldom watch any TV, but do read at least 3 hours a day – always learning things. Also get out and have fun.
Again, cannot imagine sitting around at home doing anything that would cost me $345 a month. Between Internet and Phone I now pay about $80 a month. MLB.TV costs me – I don’t remember – maybe $200 a year? Can’t take 3 people to a ML game in my market for that…and I don’t want to sit in a seat at a park for 3-plus hours alternately watching foul balls and a large scoreboard with flashy videos and loud noises.
Are those services giving you massages or something?
Hot Corner IJ
yawn
CardsFan57
Paying for the ability to watch baseball is going from passive and automatic to an active and optional participation. Things will not be the same.
avenger65
CardsFan57: NBC Sports pulled out of regional coverage of the White Sox and replaced it with a network you can only get on DirectTV,which I don’t have. NBC has robbed me of the opportunity to watch the Blackhawks and, of course, the funniest show on TV,the Sox.
PoisonedPens
Yes, that, and a blackout curtain that extends more than 200 miles, is what has me watching less baseball than ever before, other than the odd regular season game on AppleTV.
MLB doesn’t seem to realize it has an access problem, but as a cord cutter, I’m never going back to a $140 cable bill.
joew-4
You can watch for free with an antenna
PoisonedPens
Only national games, which are few and far between in the regular season;.
joew-4
No, the new network carrying the White Sox is over the air. Channels 62.2 and 62.3
PoisonedPens
That’s a good play for them. Reminds me of the old days when the Yankees were on Channel 11 WPIX.
stwawk
That’s highly unlikely. Despite what these owners and MLB imply to the contrary, MLB franchises are extremely profitable.
CardsFan57
Of course they are profitable; but, small market teams just got less profitable. It will affect their valuations.
PoisonedPens
None of that really affects valuations though, it’s just an excuse for owners to cut spending and pocket some more $M.
All of these teams are taking in $115M/year from MLB before they even play a game. That number rises every year. Everyone said the Dodgers and Mets ownership groups were crazy to pay the record numbers they paid, and in a few short years even those individual valuations also multiplied.
YankeesBleacherCreature
According to Forbes, no MLB team has historically decreased in their year-over-year valuations. All it takes is two potential buyers bidding. The loser gets nothing as there is no alternate option.
CardsFan57
How far back did Forbes look? I don’t take those kind of summary statements at face value. I need the details behind it. Frankly, that one sounds a lot like there’s never been a nationwide collapse in home prices.
YankeesBleacherCreature
It’s the best public info we got aside from the Atlanta Braves (Liberty Media). MLB attendance is up again and revenue-sharing checks will be larger for recipients.
CardsFan57
I find it extremely difficult to believe that no teams have ever lost market value. They used a cutoff date. I’d simply like to know if it was before or after the emergence of the RSNs.
YankeesBleacherCreature
Forbes estimate/sale cost:
2017 Marlins, $1B – Bruce Sherman paid $1.2B
2020 Mets, $2.4B – Steve Cohen paid $2.42B while already owning 8% of shares; Wilpons retain 5%.
2024 Orioles, $1.725B – David Rubenstein paid $1.725B and owns 97%. He also needed to buy out minority owners after his 70% purchase of Angelos’ shares.
CardsFan57
I don’t see what that tells us about the rising or falling of individual team valuations.
The teams reducing payroll this year aren’t doing it because the found an excuse to keep more money. Some of those teams have never cut payroll. They are doing it because revenue is dropping. That will affect team valuations.
Pads Fans
You can also look at the Blue Jays info.
Pads Fans
You can go back to when the Padres were sold in 2012. They were valued at $550 million and sold for $800 million
CardsFan57
So they were incorrectly valued at the time. Got it.
Pads Fans
You can look at every team sold this century. All of them have sold for more than Forbes valued the team at.
CardsFan57
The only thing you’re telling me is that Forbes is terrible at valuing teams. By the way an ealier posting by another commenter disagrees with you. I’ll let you two hash it out.
Pads Fans
Ummm, no. There are 30 teams and valuations constantly go up and the teams sell for more than 3rd party valuations consistently. All of them. Including the ones YBC mentioned.
ckc12537
I wouldn’t draw that conclusion – I would say that the new ownership group paid a premium due to geographical factors and probably a bidding war. But I don’t know the circumstances in 2012 aside from that was still during recession recovery.
ckc12537
Yup. Basic supply/demand factors at play here. Even if there is a significant economic downturn, teams aren’t bought/sold frequently like stocks are. It makes sense that team valuations would always rise.
stymeedone
They are? Wow! You must be a MLB exec and have access to all that non public information. Please tell us the average percentage of revenue that each team spends on building maintenance and upgrades on a yearly basis, and can you explain how those upgrades effect the tax valuation?
Pads Fans
3rd party valuations, like Forbes, are always going up and when teams sell, its always for more than the 3rd party valuations. There you go. Feel better now?
I CAN tell you what % of revenue TWO teams spend on building maintenance and upgrades annually because they are owned by publicly traded corporations and have to divulge that information. But hey, you are so smart you already knew that.
Pads Fans
What falling revenues? Going into the 2024 season Manfred projected a 8% increase year over year.
Minneapolis St Paul is not a smaller market. They are mid-market. The 15th largest media market and by population they are 16th.
CardsFan57
So no individual team saw revenues fall due to losing their media deal with Bally? Your stat is meaningless to individual teams unless there is 100% revenue sharing.
They are still less than half the size of the 9th market in MLB. The drop off from the top 9 to the rest is dramatic.
Pads Fans
Correct. No team that lost their DSG contract in 2023 saw a drop in TV revenue in 2024 compared to what they would have been paid by DSG.
Your stat comparing the Twins to the top 9 markets is meaningless. At 2.035 million TV households, the Twins are also in a market more than double the size of the two smallest media markets in MLB, Cincinnati and Milwaukee, which have 863k and 895k TV households respectively. .
They are the 15th in media market size and 16th in population. By definition mid-market, not small market.
CardsFan57
You are careful in your statements. How many teams lost revenue in 2024 when MLB removed the promise to completely replace the lost revenue? Nobody really knows because they are keeping all of that very tight to the vest.
The difference between the #10 market and number #30 market is far less than the difference between #1 and #10. My original term wasn’t small market teams. It was teams in smaller markets. Compared to the top 9, all the other teams are smaller market teams.
CardsFan57
Even more importantly, how many stand to lose revenue in 2025 now that only the Braves are still with Bally?
Pads Fans
No team that lost their DSG contract in 2023 saw a drop in TV revenue in 2024 compared to what they would have been paid by DSG. Period.
That is all public information as part of the DSG bankruptcy proceedings. Go read them.
You never mentioned #10. You said top 9 which includes two markets that are double or more in size from #3. Compared to those two markets ALL other markets are smaller markets. See, I cn play stupid semantics games too.
The Twins are a mid-market team. The team has said so. MLB has said so. Many in the media have said so. You seem to be the only one that is trying to argue otherwise,.
Pads Fans
Even more importantly, none of the teams that lost their DSG RSN’s in 2023 had lower TV revenue in 2024 than DSG was scheduled to be paying them.
4 of the 11 teams mentioned in the article on this website have already agreed to dropping DSG and will go with MLB in 2025. MLB has not agreed to allow DSG to drop any teams in the bankruptcy proceedings and they can block it. I fully expect most or all 11 teams to be with MLB in 2025 because they have seen how successful MLB has been in both marketing streaming packages and in negotiating contracts directly with carriers. The more teams that are with MLB, the more leverage they have and the more money teams will get.
How hard is that for you to understand?.
CardsFan57
Explain why CBT money has to be diverted if the MLB streaming is just as lucrative as the Bally deals. That’s what I’m finding hard to understand. MLB does not decide which contracts Bally can drop. The bankruptcy judge decides which contracts can be dropped. Bankruptcy judges tend to allow bankrupt companies to drop any contracts losing money.
Simm
MLB and mlbpa literally changed the cba to help teams that took a hit from the losing their cable deals. They moved 15m from luxury tax to give to these teams. The padres were one of them. That doesn’t seem like something they would do if they weren’t taking a financial hit.
Simm
Yeah they changed the cba to allow teams to receive up to 15m dollars to help cover their tv losses from what they were going to receive from their old cable deals. That isn’t something they would do if they weren’t seeing less revenue now vs. before.
Pads Fans
Say goodbye JoelP.
YankeesBleacherCreature
You spell out a word for people and then they refuse to pronounce it so you must be spelling it wrong. Lol. The cognitive dissonance force is strong.
jdgoat
Twins fans rejoice
outinleftfield
Now if Moreno would just sell the Angels.
SweetBabyRayKingsThickThighs
Now a super billionaire like Jeff Bezos can buy the team and run a 400 million payroll just to finish in 4th place!
stwawk
Then shed payroll two seasons later and make a push deep into the playoffs.
BigV
Haha yep
mlb fan
“Just to finish in 4th place”…Many people will ignore the fact that the big payroll Padres & Mets of just last year didn’t succeed(this year) until they cut, reallocated and more evenly spread out their payroll.
ATLbravos
hope billy heywood has enough capital to buy it back
HalosHeavenJJ
Selling right after the RSN took a dump is rough. That drop in the primary revenue source will certainly impact the price.
Hopefully for Twins fans a new ownership group works out.
I’d kill to have one here.
harrycarey
I wonder which Rob Manfred cohort is looking to buy when price may be lower than expected.
CCCTL
“Any of my old college roommates looking to buy a ball team? I’ve got Selig’s binder on how to do it, and he proved with John Fisher that it’s a ticket to free money.”
Pads Fans
The two teams that DSG defaulted on last season, the Padres and Diamondbacks, had no drop in TV revenue in 2024.
CardsFan57
The Twins, Rangers, and Guardians had a drop in revenue when they had to renegotiate their media payments. What’s your source for the Padres and Diamondbacks TV revenue for 2024?
Pads Fans
NONE of those teams had their contract defaulted on by DSG. They agreed to take less money.
The two teams that did, The Padres and the Diamondbacks, didn’t lose any TV revenue in 2024.
The bankruptcy hearings.
CardsFan57
Those teams were forced to either lower their contracts or agree to less money. Would they have done that if MLB would have made them whole on the contract.
Okay, I’ve finally found it. MLB and MLBPA agreed to redirect some of the CBT money to those who lost TV revenue on 7/24/2024. I did miss that. So Tampa and Oakland lose money because of Bally instead of San Diego and Arizona. It’s interesting to rob from Peter to pay Paul.
That’s limited to $15 million each team and capped at half the MLB share of the CBT. That $75 million in 2024. That money is going to disappear quickly in 2025. Everyone got dropped except Atlanta. No doubt that CBT payments to poor teams will be cut in half under this agreement.
Let the head in the sand approach to accessing the impact of the Bally bankruptcy continue. The impact may be lessened a bit. The impact may be delayed. The impact may be shifted (reducing CBT payments in favor of paying those who lost TV revenue.). The impact will ultimately be felt by every team except those at the top of the revenue stream.
DonOsbourne
You’re dead on 57. MLB has been burned by the “The good times are here and they’ll never end” plenty of time before.
CardsFan57
This could not have come at a worse time for the Cardinals. They have already begun to alienate the fan base with steadfast loyalty to an extremely unpopular head of operations. That worked when they were winning. They are no longer winning. The cutting payroll and subsequent losing is going to start a downward spiral that will be very difficult to break out of in my opinion. They’ve used up all the good will at a time it’s needed most.
outinleftfield
Cards, not sure where you found that dubious info, but if you go to cases.ra.kroll.com/DSG/ you will find the Diamond Sports bankruptcy proceedings. You will find that MLB paid the Padres $6.8 million in 2023 and the Diamondbacks $0.00 in 2023 from a $250 million pool they set aside from their general fund (estimated to be $2.5 billion) to help teams affected by the RSN bankruptcies. Neither team needed to draw from that pool in 2024. They can still draw from that in 2025 if their TV revenue falls below what it would have been until the bankruptcy is discharged.
Teams that choose to renegotiate their contract for 2024 were not eligible for reimbursement for 80% of their lost TV revenue. That would be the Rangers.
Oakland is not carried by DSG. They were carried by NBC Sports Bay Area and since they were not affected by the DSG bankruptcy, but by their own idiocy in moving out of that market, they are not eligible for reimbursement for 80% of lost TV revenue.
You keep arguing this point with everyone, but you never take the simple step of going to the source. There used to be a guy on here that was a Cardinals fan that argued non-stop and kept getting banned. Can’t remember his name, I think Blackpink was one of them, but I am willing to bet you are him.
outinleftfield
Link it and I will. No matter what it says, you can’t lie in court and the court filings in the bankruptcy case tell us exactly what MLB did as a result of Diamond Sports financial troubles.
So Joel/Blackpink, is it time to mute you on this account? Because I have had quite enough of your arguing when you are clearly wrong.
CardsFan57
Please do mute me.
mlbtraderumors.com/2024/07/mlb-mlbpa-agree-to-redi…
outinleftfield
I found what Evan Drellich wrote about it on The Athletic. nytimes.com/athletic/5656610/2024/07/24/mlb-luxury…
“The league is now permitted to redirect its portion of competitive balance tax money to clubs that have lost TV revenue”
That is money that would normally go into the MLB general fund, not money that is being taken from teams receiving revenue sharing. They will actually get a larger revenue sharing check for 2024.
Teams “whose local media revenue declined from the year prior (2023) or from the two years prior (2022)” are eligible for what’s being called a “media disruption distribution” and its ONLY for 2024.
Prior to this CBA, the CBT penalties paid were split evenly between MLB and the MLBPA, and MLB’s portion went mostly to the teams that didn’t exceed the CBT threshold, not necessarily teams that were revenue sharing recipients.
Per the union – “Prior to the current CBA, roughly half of the taxes paid by clubs who exceeded the CBT were given to clubs as a reward if they kept their payrolls below the CBT threshold — effectively creating an incentive to suppress spending,” the MLBPA wrote in its memo. “In the last CBA negotiation, we made it a priority to eliminate this ‘reward’ for failing to spend on players.”
Try reading the original article for a change.
CardsFan57
Am I to take your commentary as part of the article? I don’t go behind paywalls. I’d still like to know why this apparently unnecessary diversion of funds plan is in place.
GO1962
My impression of the youth in the Saint Louis metropolitan area and the surrounding region are either more interested in electronic games as entertainment, or soccer as a form of sports entertainment than they are in baseball. Most youth have no interest in baseball at all. They know that the name of the baseball team in Saint Louis is the Cardinals, and that is all that they know. The youth are the future consumers. Saint Louis now has a professional soccer team in town that those youth who are interested in soccer are zealous about. I believe that the DeWitt family is concerned about all of this, which they have no control over, and that is a major reason why they plan to reduce payroll. Baseball as a form of entertainment is shrinking everywhere.
BaseballisLife
Is that Joel P? I always thought the DonOsbourne account was his burner.
DonOsbourne
Interesting.
CardsFan57
It’s all quite humorous really. The syntax and writing styles are completely different. Not to mention we’re normally on the opposite sides in a discussion. Apparently you are someone else they don’t like if you write something they don’t like.
hiflew
I am not a Twins fan, but I haven’t liked Pohlad since he was basically OK with contracting the Twins (and Expos) as long as money got put in his pocket. These guys are not really “owners” of the team per se, they are simply caretakers. Teams have been around far longer than any single owner and these guys are just taking care of the team until the next caretaker comes along.
stwawk
After reading this, I thought about how the Angelos family handled the sale of the Baltimore Orioles — night and day. Baltimore is fortunate to have ridded itself of that slimy family. This is an example of how ownership should communicate their decisions to fans. I don’t know enough about their tenure to judge how the family handled the team over the decades, but this seems like a decent way to go out. I’m sure some fans will rejoice because they think a new owner will blow up payroll, but at the end of the day, the Twins are still a small market club.
Aiden Awe
Twins are far from a small market, twins are historically mid market franchise.
proton
That’s like saying I am not living at poverty level I make $100 over the poverty line. Seattle gets revenue checks and turn a profit every year. They have had from good to outstanding fan turn out to games. They still keep on keeping that check though.
DirtyWater04
No, it isn’t. 15th out of 30 clubs in market size means half the league has a smaller market than them. The only standard by which that is “small” is if you are only calling teams small market or big market. They are very comfortably in the mid-market range.
Compare to Las Vegas, which I believe is going to be the smallest market in the league. MSP is the 15th largest media market with over 1.8 million households, per the data I could find. Vegas has less than half that, just over 850k. Minneapolis is closer to being a San Fran/Bay Area (2.6 M households, the 10th largest market) than Vegas is to being a Minneapolis. That’s why the middle market designation is important. Minnesota is not particularly large, but it is also not small by any reasonable measure.
Source: mymediajobs.com/market-rankings
yeasties
I’m not quite sure how that experience can transfer because the Angelos family had a very nasty and public civil war over the team and inheritance issues. The Pohlads are not in the same situation.
ForDoingNothing
Best baseball news of my life
I was ready to cut ties with this team
Glad I no longer have to
myaccount2
Don’t expect spending to change too drastically, though.
benhen77
Obligatory reminder-since MLBTR just posted another ad. Betterhelp is not a reputable company- make sure you do some research. Have no problem with MLBTR getting the bag from them, just be a smart consumer and don’t fall for the marketing.
differentbears
It’s right there in the name. There’s a reason they’re not called BestHelp.
NYCityRiddler
Irregardless of what they call themselves they’ve hit the mother-load on this site. Ahahaha!
66TheNumberOfTheBest
Are the economics of baseball both broken and designed to favor big market teams?
Well, let’s see…
Every time a non-large market team goes on the market, it’s fans PRAY that a VERY rich guy will buy the team and pour their own money into it so they can kinda sorta almost be in the neighborhood of competing with the Dodgers and Yankees.
So…yes. The answer is yes.
CKinSTL
If only teams would all spend more money. Then they’d all win the World Series each year…
mrkinsm
Doing exactly what they were designed to do, so they can’t be broken. The 20 some odd teams exist to give the 10 big ones teams to play. Perhaps, in the future we’ll reach a point where revenue sharing is more evenly paid out (national tv – etc)…and the league will exist more like the NFL but until then….we live with it.
tigerdoc616
Twins are a low payroll team because they are a low revenue team. So unless the new owner of the Twins is a Stephen Cohen clone payroll isn’t likely to increase much. Especially since they likely took a hit on their TV deal with MLB vs what they had earned with Bally.
ForDoingNothing
Twins were 15 in revenue this year with fans tuning out the last 2 months
This coming after decades of 0 playoff wins.
This market is top 12 revenue with an owner who cares
Pads Fans
Twins – 10 playoff appearances in last 22 years. Pretty sure that is up with the top teams in terms of appearances in postseason.
ForDoingNothing
Yeah and 0 playoff wins until last year. If you don’t get it just say you don’t get it, but fans have been sick and tired of the ownership and direction of the team since 2011
Last playoffs brought back support and attendance that hadn’t been seen for a decade. Pohlad’s ended that support as quickly as it began. Minnesota fans are a tortured group, as miserable as any in the country and they have good reason to be. If you were born after 1991 you’ve never seen your team make a championship game.
They’re still extremely loyal, however, as we’ve seen with the Wolves resurgence, but if ownership doesn’t care many fans simply won’t show up. Making the playoffs and immediately being eliminated is not a moral victory for most fans any longer. They’re tired of MN teams being just good enough
martras
The Twins have won more than 87 games just once since 2010. They make the playoffs because they’ve been playing in a terrible division since Falvey became the GM. Most Twins teams since 2017 would have been .500 at best if they played in any other division than the AL Central.
BaseballisLife
Pads, I think he is talking about advancing in the playoffs, not just making it there. A first world problem to be sure, but I can see being disappointed if your team makes it to the playoffs consistently but is never in the WS.
outinleftfield
The Twins were a revenue sharing recipient in 2023, so they were 16th or lower in revenue. Do you know if they will be getting a CB pick in 2025? That is a sure sign of being a revenue sharing recipient.
martras
The Twins are absolutely a rev share recipient. They’ll be a recipient again this year as well. Whether or not you’re a recipient is going to depend on gate revenues, not the TV contracts.
outinleftfield
Revenue sharing recipient means that your total revenue fell in the bottom half of MLB. It absolutely does include local TV revenue, but does not include national TV revenue because that is split evenly by all 30 teams.
martras
The Twins aren’t a low payroll team. They’re a mid-payroll team. They’re always over $100MM in payroll. In the 15 years Target Field was open, they were only under that figure in 2013-2014 or something like that. The Twins have outspent the Tigers 1/2 the time since Target Field opened.
For Love of the Game
I bid $1.25 billion. Could someone please lend me $1.25 billion?
Canuckleball
Spoken like a true billionaire. Why spend your money when you can spend someone elses.
RockinRobin
Just post date your check.
mbreslow77
A-Rod pivot coming
Cleon Jones
Elon Musk needs something to ruin after destroying twitter.
66TheNumberOfTheBest
He’s already got the middle class square in his bullseye.
proton
I think Musk did that on purpose. He got banned got pissed and said I got some money under the seats of my sofa. Bet I can tear that place down piss off a bunch of people and have fun doing it. The guy is a great salesman would have to be to get guys to buy the ugliest truck if you can call it that ever. You think he sat around with his designers over some beers a lot of them and said let’s see how dumb buyers are. Let’s make an ugly truck. As the night went on the empties grew and things got out of hand. He woke up the same day and said what the hell is this? Then oh yeah we have something to sell to the gullible.
Pads Fans
Musk bought Twitter with investments from the Saudis, Russian oligarchs, and some of the worst people in the US like John Fisher.
Ever noticed how everything Fisher touches turns to doodoo?
Samuel
Twitter is more popular than it’s ever been – both in the US and the world.
CCCTL
Unfortunately for the muskrat, it’s only 20% as valuable as it was before he bought and advertisers jumped ship.
It takes smarts to turn $44B into $9B.
Samuel
CCCTL
I love it here…..
When MLB franchises make lots of money…it’s bad. Evil people.
When Elon Musk doesn’t make lots of money….it’s bad. Evil person.
CCCTL
I see you’re one of those that requires “/s” to detect sarcasm.
ohyeadam
If they’re going to sell I’m praying Mark Cuban buys. He’s wanted into the league for a while now and he’s a great owner. He’s got plenty of his own money to spend if he wants too
avenger65
ohyeadam: Cuban is the rare good guy billionaire. He’s a part owner of the Dallas Mavericks so it wouldn’t be a big leap to go into baseball ownership.
prov356
avenger – “…rare good guy billionaire.”
So, how many billionaires do you personally know to be able to cast such a wide generalization that most of them are not good guys?
proton
I was hoping he would buy the Ms. Still think the best for the team is for Jody Allen to buy them. Pay the ownership group what it wants own 100% of the team then let the management team build a winner. Give them a very high budget and say build me a WS winning team. Her and Paul were very much hands off. Engaged but smart enough to let the experts do their jobs.
differentbears
Based on the state of the Trail Blazers, I don’t think you want Jody Allen owning the Mariners.
I don’t think she wants any of it, she seems to be reluctantly involved in ownership, awaiting the time to sell.
User 2770661946
Best case scenario is Stanley Hubbard has interest. Could solve the tv side of it with a stroke of a pen. Although he is 91 so maybe he’ll have to blow into a tube to sign
RunDMC
Thanks for the chuckle.
avenger65
Ditto.
BaseballisLife
Glen Taylor owns part of the Twolves. What do Minnesota fans think of him?
alcameron
I know if my team went on such a slide and had the Tigs roar by them to get in the playoffs I’d look to get the hell out of there too!!
Go Tigs! Punching their ticket to the ALCS tonight and let the magic keep rolling all the way to the series!
Old York
Anyone here willing to combine some income and buy the team with me?
RockinRobin
Go Fund Me?
Old York
@RockinRobin
Hard to get to $1.5B on GFM.
RockinRobin
Give it a shot!
Pads Fans
I can pitch in $2 million. Now we just need another $1.5 billion or so.
proton
I got like $25 disposable income. I am in.
Pads Fans
Woooo hoooo! We are getting closer.
outinleftfield
Put me down for $50k.
ckc12537
I really wish that the author would have taken 5 seconds to convert $44 million in 1984 to an inflation-adjusted $133 million purchase price in 2024 dollars. I’m guessing they can get at least $1.6 billion now.
outinleftfield
in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1984?amount=1000000
That was for $1 million so as you said $44 million would be worth $133,311,106.72 today.
That is better than a 1000% ROI. I believe that is a 20% annual rate of return using compound interest over 40 years. Maybe an investment banker on here could help with that calculation. I think the S&P 500 has averaged around 10% annual rate of return since then. Pretty nice return for the Pohlad family.
martras
Don’t quit your day job.
$44MM invested into a Stock Index fund (an S&P 500 Index) in 1984 would be worth $3.5B today.
officialdata.org/us/stocks/s-p-500/1984?amount=440…
Incidentally, if you want to calculate the annualized rate or return simply…
(1,500,000,000 / 44,000,000)^(1/40) = 9.2%
outinleftfield
My day job is constructing large buildings.
What you are saying is true only if you re-invested 100% of the dividends. With a sports teams, you are not reinvesting the dividends into an interest bearing vehicle or security.
The S&P 500 had around a 10% annual rate of return over that time frame.
Mikenmn
Chances are there will be no significant FA signings this offseason, because new owners would like as clean a slate as possible to make their own player and financial decisions. The next question would be whether the new owners would look to extract $ from state and local government. Target Field is only about 15 years old.
ForDoingNothing
Have you seen the average age of the twins roster and where they rank in terms of farm systems? They’re near top five in combined pro and farm talent.
No owner in the right mind would come in and try and start over
Mikenmn
I should have been clearer. Not at all running down the talent, what I meant was that a new owner might not want to have “bought” along with the team some new significant contracts. There are going to be some expensive FA
ohyeadam
Every owner pulls money from local govt
Mikenmn
I know, part of the business model.
dclivejazz
I thought such major announcements were supposed to be kept under wraps until after the World Series concludes. I guess if you are an owner who wants to get out, you don’t care. Or maybe they sensed there may be other owners who are also looking to unload and want to be the first to draw the interest of potential buyers.
wkkortas
“What is this ‘hope’ you speak of?”
–Pirates fans
differentbears
It’s pronounced Skenes.
beckmt
Scary thing for me is could a group from Nashville offer like $2 billion to move the club. And what would baseball do with that.
ckc12537
I doubt they would move from MSP. That’s a top 5 ballpark there.
Old York
@ckc12537
Then you could move the stadium to Oakland and they’ll have a new stadium. Problem solved!
Citizen1
Rays stadium now not playable. They can play in Nashville for a year or two to see if fans show up
Pads Fans
They are saying on news stations in Tampa that it will cost $150-$170 to replace the roof. It only cost $138 million to build originally.
outinleftfield
Nah Pads Fans. They are saying that the engineering group that originally installed the roof has said that a rough guess based on current building codes is a cost of $150-170 million,, but that they can’t give an estimate until the engineering assessment is complete.
I think that if they find the building to still be structurally sound and since they can no longer use the Teflon coated fiberglass that the original roof was made of because it won’t meet the building codes, that they will go with some type of Fluon ETFE. It is much, much lighter and will be cheaper, but still $100 million or more.
ckc12537
$138 million in the 90’s? Is the value of a dollar fixed?
outinleftfield
That cost would be about $282 million today.
ckc12537
I know. I just think it would have been relevant for a quality writer to have done the calculation and include it.
I’m sorry that went over your head.
Pads Fans
So including inflation it cost $282 million in today’s dollar to build the entire stadium and they are talking about more than half that to replace the roof IF the structure is still sound after a hurricane ripped the roof off.
Looks like insurance is not going to cover the costs since the roof was well past its 25 year projected lifespan, so the city would be footing the bill. To me that doesn’t appear to be a good investment for the city of St Petersburg.
So where will they play the 2025 season?
ohyeadam
They can’t leave until the lease is up on Target Field. 30 year lease is halfway through
Tom the ray fan
Wonder if Bob dylan likes baseball
Samuel
Actually, he does.
Been a Yankees season ticket holder for decades.
This one belongs to the Reds
Sad to see another family ownership bowing out, but they can’t keep up anymore. Corporate ownership is pretty much the standard in the minors now too.
Acoss1331
I know Twins fans haven’t been, enthusiastic to put it lightly, with Pohlads but at least they’ve tried to make the Twins a winning franchise. I would definitely take them over Jerry Reinsdorf in a heartbeat.
3768902
Christmas came early this year, bishes!
Citizen1
Which twin are they selling?
hoof hearted
Do away with the ” signing team loses a draft pkck’. Remove the road block that delays teams of signing top FA because of losing a pick.
Citizen1
Not gonna happen, Scot boras
kje76
Wouldn’t that just hurt the small market teams in favor of the big markets?
panj341
Can’t wait for grandson of Nutting to sell the Pirates in 50 years. Oh wait I don’t think I can live past 100.
Olddfrt.
They can offer to buy Chris Bryant from the Rockies now.
Olddfrt.
Twins to purchase Anthony Rendon from the Angels!
Posttheghost
What a come up, bought at 44mil. Grandkids found out how much the team is worth, decided to cash out lol
martras
Grandkids have no ownership stake.
Carl Pohlad -> Jim Pohlad (principal owner), Bill Pohlad, Bob Pohlad (collectively known as the Pohlad Family for Twins ownership)
YaGottaBelieveAgain
MIN as a team I believe has a lot of potential in the short term just like teams in SEA, CIN, PIT who are just on the cusp of being a playoff team.
MIN have players to build around and fans to support them.
Just need good judgement on resources, judgement of players to sign as FA and trade for.
Can Joe Mauer get involved (or is he already) in some capacity like Buster Posey in SF?
FOmeOLS
Does this mean the Twins are get rid of as many financial burdens as possible to make the sale simpler?
If that is the case, the Twins aren’t going to be involved in free agency, and will likely be trading away a lot of assets, as potential buyers get more serious.
So next season, there’s three teams and then twins and WSox…
The glory days recede farther and faster.
martras
It’ll be tough to clear salary with NTC’s on Correa and Buxton. Aside from that, I don’t think they’d do that until there was a strong buyer interest.
Carl W.
Not much different than buying your home for 44K in 1984 and doing some upgrades over the last 40 years. Then asking 1.4 mil for it. Who’s lining up for that? They may be out there but it’s not a huge amount of people.
martras
Real estate prices have increased at about a 5% rate.
The stock market has increased at about a 10% rate.
The Twins appreciated at about a 9% rate.
zacharydmanprin
Let John Fisher buy them…
Stone Seal
This headline sure sounds odd if you didn’t know who owned the Twins before now.
JR513
I don’t the twins get moved . I Could see a team like the Pittsburgh Pirates being moved since there markets so small to somewhere like Montreal or Memphis . Pirates will be next to move since there stadium contracts up in two or three years.
BaseballisLife
Pirates have an incredible ballpark, maybe the best in baseball. And when your favorite team visits they have a better than 50% chance of winning. I would hope they wouldn’t move.
ellisd19830
Wheres Arod? He wanted the wolves. Only makes sense he goes after the twins.
guilderc
He owned them during the Yanks 2009 run to the World Series. Was that not enough?
martras
Alex Rodriguez is currently part of the purchasing group involved with the Timberwolves. Greedy and slick Glen Taylor called off the purchase when the team skyrocketed in value. There’s an arbitration session scheduled for November. I think Alex Rodriguez’s team will be successful.
JSubs
Don’t sell yet, Hire Roger Beshens as your pitching coach and instant chance at World Series EVERY YEAR. Understand pitchers that don’t learn that Football Slider take forever to develop, when Roger Beshens teaches them his Grip,Tilt and Wrist action which is on center grip, throw like football stiff wrist, all of a sudden a Cole, Glasnow, Wheeler, PUK, Ginkel, are created IN NO TIME. Contact Roger Beshens his Resume is in May 2024 he has a video of him showing techniques to Brent Strom, Ryne Nelson was the best pitcher on the team withing weeks. Take 30 minutes of your day talk to him and you will hear techniques only he understands cause he threw that Football Slider probably 20,000 times from ALL ARM ANGLES. That sweeper and Gyro is his Football Slider.
pjmcnu
“The Twins are the heart & soul of our family,” said Pohland. “But the lawyers just said we might get over $1 billion, with a B, for the team and fans keep demanding we spend actual money on it. Like every year! So we’re exploring cashing out grandpa’s investment. In many lofty, rhetorical ways, the Twins belong to Minneapolis, St. Paul, the fans, and Minnesota more broadly. However, we will be keeping all of the money ourselves and paying the best lawyers and accountants to find ways not to pay any taxes on it. We love the Twin Cities & Twins Nation! In many lofty, rhetorical ways, it is our home and you all are part of our family, too. However, we plan to move to Palm Beach immediately after the sale closes. Please don’t visit. Best of luck with whatever miserly, baseball-indifferent billionaire decides this is a good investment, and Go Twins!”
mbgutt
MLB needs floor and cap.
hyraxwithaflamethrower
I don’t see the point in a floor, save for the players to make even more. And it’s not like $700k minimum to play a game isn’t way, way more than most of us make. For teams, yeah, you might avoid some perennial sucking, but just as many teams will miss the playoffs, just as many will have next to no real shot going into the final week, etc. Even if you set the floor fairly high, say at $75M, or even $100M, that team’s likely to get run over by big spenders like the Dodgers. All that’s changed is teams are being forced to spend more to lose by a slightly narrower margin.
As for a cap, I’m more in favor of that, but players would never go for it, even if they got a floor in return.
martras
Proved in the last CBA. Owners offered a $100MM floor in exchange for a hard cap. MLBPA will die on Salary Cap Hill.
Pads Fans
Players offered to negotiate a hard cap if the owners would open their books for all 30 teams like it is in the other major sports in the US that have hard caps. If you don’t know what the teams are making, you can’t determine what a fair cap would be for both parties without limiting player salaries unfairly. The owners refused. Discussion over.
Also, Manfred said when talking about the health of the sport that back in 2021-2022 offseason that no team had an annual revenue under $250 million. MLB revenue overall has gone up since then. That means every team, even guys like the Rays, Marlins, A’s, and Pirates, can have a MLB payroll of at least $125 million and still make a healthy profit. Why would the owners lowball at a $100 million floor?
Just some things to think about.
hyraxwithaflamethrower
There go my dreams of inheriting the team from my kindly grandfather when he passes.
Pads Fans
That was a great movie.
Angels & NL West
Hope the Pohlands don’t pull a “Moreno” and take the team off the market. That was a gut punch for Angels fans.
Man What Runs With the Football
So, where will the Twins move to? Nashville, Portland, Charlotte, or Oklahoma City? Hopefully we will know soon
martras
The Target Field lease goes to 2040…
Man What Runs With the Football
Contracts can be bought out, or cancelled. Lawyers are employed because of their expertise in finding clauses and loopholes,so I wouldn’t count my chickens until they hatch. Not saying they won’t stay, but it is sometimes easier to break the contract and tie it up in court for years until someone runs out of money.
Pads Fans
In March of this year the team agreed to extend the lease to 2059. In return the county agreed to contribute $9 million of the ballpark sales tax proceeds per year to a capital expenditure fund to maintain and improve the ballpark.
beckershospitalreview.com/finance/minnesota-county…
Pads Fans
Ahhhhhh JoelP/BlackPink/Cardsfan57 is gone. What will be his next account name?
BaseballisLife
Going to take a swing at guessing the sale price and the ownership group.
$1.8 billion to the Groupon guy Lefkowsky who was rumored to be interested in the White Sox and Timberwolves.
Pads Fans
Are you talking about Eric Lefkofsky? His was a co founder and is a chairperson of Groupon and is the founder of Tempus, an AI company in the medical field. He is a genius.
He might be a good fit. They live in Chicago He is from Michigan and went to Michigan. His wife is from Chicago and went to Wisconsin. So they are both upper Midwest kids
Moneyballer
The Pohlad’s should make one final run at greatness and poor money into next years team, give them a legit chance. If it works out they will have a more valuable product to sell, if it doesn’t work out the next regime can deal with the contracts. This would also rehabilitate their image before selling. It’s time to go ALL-IN, the fans deserve it!
GarryHarris
I remember when MLB voted to eliminate the Twins and Expos.
RoyalsFanAmongWolves
And all this time, I thought the twins were owned by a 12-year-old kid named Billy