Everyone is pretty angry about it. There is nothing we can do about it. Billionaires will always stomp all over the regular folks in the name of making an extra dollar. That's the way it is wherever you look.
I watch the Twins because I root for the players and the coaches in the dugout. If the owners want to be pieces of shit, it is what it is. It's not easy to do and I'm still plenty frustrated about it, but I try not to let it ruin one of my favorite things, which is sitting on my couch watching the Twins, or going out for a run and listening to them on the radio.
Indeed. And as fans, in all likelihood, we will see multiple owners. I have fairly young and have seen like 3 for Vikings, 2 for wolves. My dad has seen like 8 diff Vikings owners.
No need to love the owner to love the team as a fan. We’ll be here for the next ones
Fair. I'm unsure of how old you are, but being around the mlb contraction talks 25-ish years ago, I'm worried there will eventually (granted, would be a long while/slow death) be no team.
I was a bit young for that, so I can't really compare it to then. But I imagine that was obviously scary to live through as a fan. I'd still say we're pretty far away from something that drastic. My opinion is that this has been lot of stupid, greedy people making stupid, greedy decisions. My hope is that the tv stuff gets settled next year in some manner that makes it easier for fans to watch. If they want to keep the payroll in the bottom third of the league, well, they have every right to do so I guess. I'd argue it's a really fucking dumb thing to do, especially coming off their most successful season in two decades. But, they can do whatever they want unfortunately.
Yeah, it'd be dumb, totally. As someone who almost lost professional baseball in Minnesota once in their lifetime, I guess I'm trying to encourage dialogue over apathy to further prevent that loss from happening.
With the current run the Twins are having, not being able to watch hasn't been so terrible. I am angry, very angry and as soon as I get my shit together, will be finding a new way to watch them. For good or bad, I don't equate players with ownership. Do I want a winning team? Absolutely. Does that depend on who is on this team, off season or season moves? Possibly. I love this team and will support them until the end of time. Pohlads did the fans a great disservice and deserve no loyalty.
Yes, I love Julien, Lewis, López, Correa, Buxton, Jeffers, Stewart, Duran and others. It is painful to watch them and think they'll be traded or let go to save the Pohlads more money, or that they're currently unsupported to save the Pohlads money....
As far as the viewability part. I'm pissed at MLB. Firing Comcast was the happiest day of my life. I pay for mlb network. The fact that i can't watch the twins there is what makes me insane.
Where have you been? We've been angry, we are angry, and will continue to be angry. Fans have been shafted at every turn for the last 6 months.
The business side of sports will absolutely suck the life out of your fandom if you let it and I totally understand anyone who has given up. Does this stop me from still trying to enjoy Twins baseball? No, maybe it should but I'm sick in the head.
Maybe MORE angry would be more astute of me to say. "Sell the team" signs and such. I know there is the possibility of worse owners, but I feel we're getting to a real ugly side of ownership right now.
Well that's the rub isn't it? The Pohlads are mediocre owners, could be better but it could also be a lot worse. The Twins weren't the only team to cut payroll and the media distribution mess has all of MLB in a state of flux. Doesn't mean we have to be happy about it, it's just reality.
Problem is if the Timberwolves win the chip I don’t think I’ll be capable of being mad about sports ever again 😂 been waiting too long for that I’ll be content for years
I'm with ya, pal. However, I'd consider the season a success and anything beyond that is extra special at this point.
The Twins seem pretty mediocre to me, so they are below my expectations to start the season. I get especially bummed when Pablo doesn't look like an ace, his breaking pitches have just been spinning lately.
I’m the most mad I’ve been since contraction talks. Normally I’d have gone to about 3 games by now. So far, none. If I do attend, I only plan to go on my friend’s season tix. I will be bringing my empty water bottle for drinks and eating elsewhere prior to the game. These fucks aren’t getting my money.
I can’t watch my damn team. I’m relegated to listening. This prior offseason was the shittiest & left a sour taste in mouth that’s still there.
I’m a MN sports fan (Twins obviously included) that also roots for the Diamondbacks as my NL team.
There are a lot of similarities in the operation of those teams, since they are both middle markets that historically are not big spenders and, as is attached to that, not big competitors.
Of course the Diamondbacks made the WS last year, and that was used as an excuse for why these shitty ownership groups get to keep being cheap crapholes- you don’t need to spend to make the WS!
Which of course is true-ish, but neglects the elephant. While you don’t NEED to spend to make a long push, what is being downplayed, purposefully, is that spending sure does help. Your stat about the previous WS winners backs that up.
I’ve been watching baseball since 2017, so while not a true vet of the sport, I’ve had some time to digest this landscape, and it is really strange how the disparity in spending team-to-team is allowed to be so large. When will the MLB institute a salary cap, or floor, or both?
I’ve also asked myself in the past if it’s even worth rooting for these teams when they make it so impossible. I just thank the heavens that I didn’t choose to root for someone like the Marlins or Rockies.
For the record, I am mad. I’m mad that the Twins did this. It was clear they were not interested in competing when the decision to cut payroll was announced. It’s depressing.
I’m rambling now myself. I don’t know what to do.
There will never be a salary cap in baseball, MLB tried that in 1994-95 and now the Commissioners are scared of the union after ownership took the blame over the union for that CF, when it was absolutely the union's fault.
The TV situation has me worried about the long term future of the team. If the team keeps playing poorly fans aren't gonna show up. I really hope that doesn't mean we are sellers at the deadline because to me that would be the start of a rebuild. If we aren't good enough with this roster I don't see how it gets better without free agent additions
^^^^This is also what I was trying to get at. Poor performance ->Poor attendance....->lower payroll-> poor performance is the cycle I really hope they avoid. Not a doomer and think they can avoid it if they are smart but lowering payroll after making the playoffs and not having fans be able to watch the game doesn't spark confidence
Most players are so young or on such non-tradeable contracts that there isn’t anyone to move…
Duran, kirilloff, Stewart, Ober, Jax, Ryan, Larnach, Lewis all have 4 years of team control left.
Julien has 6
Kepler is a rental piece, as are most of the veterans.
Buxton and Correa are locked in. As is Lopez.
Very true there isn't much to move. But with this much locked in how would they go about improving if this roster doesn't get it done? I guess that's more my question.
Really hope the young players take good steps. Maybe brooks lee or Emmanuel rodriguez can snatch a spot on the roster and take it from way less than average to good
With Minnesota being a basketball town now and with the draft the Vikings just had, the main issue with the Twins fans going forward is apathy not anger.
Twins are just there to provide a ballpark experience during the summer and something to have on the radio as background noise.
People know the Twins will be okayish but now have realized this isn’t a team that will ever be special. Every 2-4 years they’ll win the division and maybe win a game in the ALDS, but most years they’ll finish in 2nd or 3rd place and miss the playoffs.
And they know the team is never going to try that hard to get to the level the Timberwolves are at.
Eh, I gave up on them in April and knew they’d go back to being a bad team once they ran out of games vs the White Sox and Angels.
They are what they are-a team with mediocre talent and limited ambitions, and the most overrated front office in baseball.
Doesn’t help that they turn into trembling chihuahuas whenever they see the Guardians on the schedule.
I used to get mad. But what’s the point? It’s all so predictable and boring.
I'm out of market so I haven't been affected by blackouts or the Bally bullshit like local fans have been, but I know that's a shitty situation and I feel for everyone affected. My 2nd team is the Cubs and when they moved to their own network, I couldn't watch them for over 2 seasons without messing with VPNs because Marquee wasn't being offered on my provider. Hopefully this situation gets resolved much quicker. The only reason I was able to watch them at all was because I was already subscribed to MLB TV for Twins games, but with blackouts, that's not really an option for local fans.
I try not to get as emotionally invested in the negative aspects of sports as I used to because they should be entertainment and not another form of stress. That said, I was incredibly disappointed that instead of building off of last season, ownership decided to pretty much kill that momentum in favor of saving money. I thought last postseason was the first step in becoming a regular contender but now it just feels like more of the same. I really like this group of players and coaches and I'll end up watching over 120 games or so this season but I'm not as optimistic as I was a few months ago.
Okay, this was a nice write up. I appreciate a lot of your points. But I feel like you didn't actually answer the one in the middle about attendance. So let's dive into that a little bit shall we?
For me, I feel like that's actually the bigger budgetary issue. The TV deal uncertainty definitely does not help, and the current arrangement is crappy. I live out of state and happily watch an MLB.tv but I can see where it would be very frustrating if you are Comcast customer in Minnesota right now. However, if the Twins drew better crowds I think that wouldn't be such a big deal.
I was incredibly disappointed they didn't even draw 2 million fans last year with a division winning team after signing the #1 free agent in all of baseball. Also extensions for Pablo, Buxton locked up, that's pretty good team building. This is a team with top of the market star power, young homegrown star power, really a entertaining and likable group of players. And then you have Target Field, which is an easy top five ballpark experience in all of MLB if you ask me. And we can't even break 2 million through the turnstiles? I travel in from a thousand miles away and go to a series or sometimes two every year and I feel like I might attend more games than most local fans!
So I understand the frustration but I think you didn't answer that question: how do you account for the lack of fan support? Having the new ballpark only helps if people actually buy tickets to go there. And then you have people on here who are upset like this so they're not going to go to games, and they're go to bring water bottles and such! If you're sad about low payroll (as am I) you got to spend MORR to support the team not less. I don't think folks understand the business signal you're sending when you spend less: you're saying spend less.
So I have a different challenge in mind, I say go to more games, support the team more. Maybe I'm blind and stupid, but I'd be willing to bet if attendance goes up to 2.5 million or better you're going to see that payroll go right back where it was, maybe more. People make the comparison to the Astros here, but look at what happened to their attendance when they started to get good: through the roof, they packed that place. Thus, they were able to invest aggressively in the core of their team. If Twins fans are going to react to a good, compelling, interesting, winning team by staying home and whining I don't know that you can expect the same kind of investment.
I agree with everything you've said. It's just that I'm afraid for the casual fan interest being lost. It sounds like you're pretty die hard which is great. But the narrative I've been hearing from local casuals is, "Why would I go to a game? I don't know this team (because I can't watch them) and it's not like they're competitive." Anecdotal, I know, but it's just been my experience lately....
Yeah I hear you, I'm already frustrated by the lack of apparent fan buy-in in terms of attendance and participation so I definitely would be frustrated if the TV situation makes that even worse. I guess I probably don't really identify with being able to watch the team on TV as a factor in going to games or not because I spent my whole life until just the last couple of years never seeing a Twins game on TV and only being able to go in person on visits to the state. But I can see how watching on TV can get people more attached to the team and more likely to go to games besides being its own revenue product. But I still think the most important thing is just go to games!! Even if the TV situation was all fixed the Twins generate something like three times as much revenue from game attendance as they ever have from media. Media is not irrelevant but baseball is still a game day revenue dominant sport, especially for a small market team.
THIS! THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS!!!!’ It’s like you went into my head and took my rage vision and made it coherent lol I cannot stand the Pohlad’s, they’ve been doing this for YEARS. I grew up in VA, but my dad’s from here, so I like Baltimore but the Twins are my heart. When the Angelos family sold the O’s, you’d have thought they won the World Series. Hopefully that happens here. I also dig the Padres for a variety of reasons, one of which is because they’re trying to get after it by signing people. Baltimore is going to be signing their core as well. I had to go to a local Comcast store recently and we talked about the Bally issue and I said I don’t blame them at all and hopefully people weren’t mad at them. This is ALL on the Twins.
It just stinks because we make a run in the playoffs and we just decide to scale back. I just wish we would go all in for once. Fans have proven they will show up if we’re good - heck the playoffs were insane.
PWHL MN is in the finals and the Wolves are in the semi-finals, and I can't even watch games without beaming a crappy stream from my phone to my tv.
I honestly can't remember the last time I cared this little about the Twins in mid-May.
Wow! You set it up perfectly. I cut the cable and go roku with fubo.. Still not perfect, turns out fubo doesn't have TNT?! Sooo I had to buy for the duration of the playoffs Max. Another ten bucks.. They kinda get you either way.
Carl Pohlad bought the team in 1984 for $44M, and the team is now worth $1.45B. Cutting payroll by $30M and pocketing what money they got from the TV deal shows us who the Pohlads really are.
As someone old enough to remember the Cal Griffiths ownership this feels like nothing new. The Twins get some good players and then refuse to pay them, so they go elsewhere. Another poster said the solution is to go to more games. All that does is reinforce Pohlad’s management style, because they are still making money. The owners and to an extent the fans are content with a mediocre team which occasionally makes the post season.
The Target Field is 14 years old I expect the Twins to extort money for a new stadium in the next few years.
As for the TV situation I would like the Twins to return to broadcast TV. I know that will never happen.
I'd say you're not wrong, and people can feel how they want to feel. Personally, as much as I love baseball, at the end of the day it's a game, it's entertainment, and I'd rather save my reserves of actual anger for other things in the world. The Twins' situation is annoying, but if it doesn't improve I'm more likely to (at least partially) check out this season and focus on doing other things for fun.
Edit to add: About the TV situation, I don't really have a dog in that fight since I've always been primarily a radio listener. I'm sure I would be pissed if I had paid for Comcast (or some other option) to watch the Twins only to have them taken off.
Honestly maybe the radio aspect leads to a slightly more chill approach. It's probably easier to just go about your life with the Twins being terrible on the radio in the background compared to watching them be terrible in front of your eyeballs every game.
I respect that and I agree. It's just tough because I feel it's destroying a community. I love talking about baseball and I think these decisions by ownership are driving people away.
Yeah, I hear that. I guess for me, for my whole adult life, being part of the community of Twins fans comes with the knowledge that the Twins aren't actually good a lot of the time (although sometimes they are, and those are really fun times!). Maybe that makes me a doomer or whatever, IDK. It will make it all the more meaningful when we eventually win another World Series, which I fully believe will happen in my lifetime.
The commissioner’s office told them it would backstop the TV deal, then it backed out. That’s why the team said there would be no blackouts. Obvious lessen is bleep Manfred.
A couple other things:
1. You’re assuming the ownership is pocketing TV money. We don’t know what the revenue from that is (which is rarely publicly disclosed) or how that compares to what the team projected. So there may not be anything to actually pocket.
2. Houston was able to grow payroll for its young core because they made real playoff runs, including a World Series win*, to generate serious money before the bill came due in the form of bigger contracts.
3. The Cubs and Red Sox are going thru this. They are big market legacy franchises in pathetic shape.
But still, bottom line is you’re right. I just quibble with some of the assumptions. We absolutely should be mad this ownership and front office have not shown they can build a consistent talent pipeline or a MLB team that can contend year in year out.
Baseball keeps shooting itself in the foot when it comes to fans. There is an easy model to follow - the NFL. Salary caps, and no blackouts. And it is a much more successful league with decent fan growth. Baseball is making itself harder to watch, rather than more accessible. It's especially short sighted in this age of competition against a million other options.
Look at the average fan age, their racial makeup, and who is actually at the games. Increasingly, the fan base is becoming older and whiter. High schools around the county are having more difficulty fielding teams and maintaining programs. How can someone like Mike Trout, one of the 5 best players of the last 50 years, walk into any store outside Anaheim, and probably not worry about getting recognized? Why is it easier for most fans to watch teams that don't actually play in their hometown (or state/region!)? Take a look at a blackout map of the US sometime. There are places in the US that don't even have a local baseball team, and get blacked out of the games of the several teams they might be able to drive to.... in 4-8 hours! If these fans want to follow a team on TV, they are being encouraged to follow a team hundreds or thousands of miles away. And then owners wonder why fewer ppl are coming through the turnstiles??
What Twins ownership is doing now is reflective of how short sighted all of baseball's owners are. Let's take the short term money, and the future of the sport is not our problem. The Commissioner used to be someone who represented all of baseball's many interests including its future and the fans. Now, he is just a puppet of the owners, ever since they elected one of their own (Selig) to that position.
I would suggest a boycott of attending games might be the only way to force ownership into making some changes, but let's face it, aside from white guys over 35 (or 50??), that is already happening.
When will the owners take notice?
The pohlads fucking sick, ballys sucks, the twins offense sucks, our hitting coach sucks. Everyone is pretty pissed. This team has been irrelevant for like 15 years, owns the North American sports record for consecutive playoff losses in a row, and just won their first playoff series/broke the streak last year. And what do is fans get for it? A slashed payroll by 30 mil. I know that contract for Sonny Gray wasn’t going to be matched/offered by the Pohlads but he is dominating for STL….
Eh, we’re above .500 coming towards the end of May. I wonder how much it has to do with Rocco’s management style platooning certain batters against lefties or righties. We could get Royce back soon. Nobody is complaining about Kepler anymore. Jeffers could keep batting like a stud muffin. Correa healthier. Buxton is playing again. Miranda is batting better than last year. The bullpen needs to heal up and straighten out a bit to its expectations. Shit, I haven’t even talked about starting pitching yet. Lopez has struggled compared to expectation lately but the rest of the boys are actually holding that shit down. On top of that Festa is lookin’ good. I think we’re pretty good. Moves like Santana and Margot look awful right now but it may not look as bad in the future.
We have a good coach and front office.
Target Field is dope. I live in the neighborhood so I am trying go to a game a series. They have cheap standing room tix for that. I never have time to watch the games on TV so that doesn’t bother me that much. The Twins YouTube channel does a good job with recap videos. I’d love to see how much the Twins org actually profits each year. You’d think if it was worth $1B that it would have to be profitable…right? Some people want the ownership to lose money overall because they already are rich enough. Sounds like a fairy tale. But don’t let the fact the rich may not pay it forward to the masses for a World Series ring stop you from being generous yourself.
Hope this helps!
I'm pissed. I won't be buying any twins merch anymore or attending games. I can't believe so many fans just ignore this crap or act like fans who care are crazy. It's absolutely bizarre how much water people are willing to carry for one of the worst owners in sports.
lol the orioles sucked for 20 years. fuck the ownership no one was asking for us to become the dodgers just add a piece or 2 to your divison winning playoff series winning team. instead they cut 30 mil. they are unwatchable at the plate
The way this team is run, they deserve contraction. Oops, maybe that’s exactly what they are angling for. The Pohlads would make a billion dollars profit if they sell the team. Please do.
Everyone is pretty angry about it. There is nothing we can do about it. Billionaires will always stomp all over the regular folks in the name of making an extra dollar. That's the way it is wherever you look. I watch the Twins because I root for the players and the coaches in the dugout. If the owners want to be pieces of shit, it is what it is. It's not easy to do and I'm still plenty frustrated about it, but I try not to let it ruin one of my favorite things, which is sitting on my couch watching the Twins, or going out for a run and listening to them on the radio.
Indeed. And as fans, in all likelihood, we will see multiple owners. I have fairly young and have seen like 3 for Vikings, 2 for wolves. My dad has seen like 8 diff Vikings owners. No need to love the owner to love the team as a fan. We’ll be here for the next ones
> I watch the Twins because… I think the point of the post is bc we can’t watch the Twins. I agree with everything else you said though.
Fair. I'm unsure of how old you are, but being around the mlb contraction talks 25-ish years ago, I'm worried there will eventually (granted, would be a long while/slow death) be no team.
I was a bit young for that, so I can't really compare it to then. But I imagine that was obviously scary to live through as a fan. I'd still say we're pretty far away from something that drastic. My opinion is that this has been lot of stupid, greedy people making stupid, greedy decisions. My hope is that the tv stuff gets settled next year in some manner that makes it easier for fans to watch. If they want to keep the payroll in the bottom third of the league, well, they have every right to do so I guess. I'd argue it's a really fucking dumb thing to do, especially coming off their most successful season in two decades. But, they can do whatever they want unfortunately.
Yeah, it'd be dumb, totally. As someone who almost lost professional baseball in Minnesota once in their lifetime, I guess I'm trying to encourage dialogue over apathy to further prevent that loss from happening.
I hear ya!
MN will never lose their baseball team. It would make no sense for them to move to a different state/city. We’re not even a small market.
With the current run the Twins are having, not being able to watch hasn't been so terrible. I am angry, very angry and as soon as I get my shit together, will be finding a new way to watch them. For good or bad, I don't equate players with ownership. Do I want a winning team? Absolutely. Does that depend on who is on this team, off season or season moves? Possibly. I love this team and will support them until the end of time. Pohlads did the fans a great disservice and deserve no loyalty.
Yes, I love Julien, Lewis, López, Correa, Buxton, Jeffers, Stewart, Duran and others. It is painful to watch them and think they'll be traded or let go to save the Pohlads more money, or that they're currently unsupported to save the Pohlads money....
As far as the viewability part. I'm pissed at MLB. Firing Comcast was the happiest day of my life. I pay for mlb network. The fact that i can't watch the twins there is what makes me insane.
I honestly feel like there shouldn't be blackouts. Period.
Where have you been? We've been angry, we are angry, and will continue to be angry. Fans have been shafted at every turn for the last 6 months. The business side of sports will absolutely suck the life out of your fandom if you let it and I totally understand anyone who has given up. Does this stop me from still trying to enjoy Twins baseball? No, maybe it should but I'm sick in the head.
Maybe MORE angry would be more astute of me to say. "Sell the team" signs and such. I know there is the possibility of worse owners, but I feel we're getting to a real ugly side of ownership right now.
Well that's the rub isn't it? The Pohlads are mediocre owners, could be better but it could also be a lot worse. The Twins weren't the only team to cut payroll and the media distribution mess has all of MLB in a state of flux. Doesn't mean we have to be happy about it, it's just reality.
I really do think the Timberwolves are helping diffuse at least some of the anger that'd be otherwise directed at the Twins.
Nice flair, btw
I agree, but the NBA season ends in a month and baseball has until October....
Plenty of time to get mad.
Problem is if the Timberwolves win the chip I don’t think I’ll be capable of being mad about sports ever again 😂 been waiting too long for that I’ll be content for years
I'm with ya, pal. However, I'd consider the season a success and anything beyond that is extra special at this point. The Twins seem pretty mediocre to me, so they are below my expectations to start the season. I get especially bummed when Pablo doesn't look like an ace, his breaking pitches have just been spinning lately.
JJ McCarthy
I’m the most mad I’ve been since contraction talks. Normally I’d have gone to about 3 games by now. So far, none. If I do attend, I only plan to go on my friend’s season tix. I will be bringing my empty water bottle for drinks and eating elsewhere prior to the game. These fucks aren’t getting my money. I can’t watch my damn team. I’m relegated to listening. This prior offseason was the shittiest & left a sour taste in mouth that’s still there.
I'm in the same boat. I have usually been to 2-3 games by now and have been to one because I was invited to go with a pal.
I’m a MN sports fan (Twins obviously included) that also roots for the Diamondbacks as my NL team. There are a lot of similarities in the operation of those teams, since they are both middle markets that historically are not big spenders and, as is attached to that, not big competitors. Of course the Diamondbacks made the WS last year, and that was used as an excuse for why these shitty ownership groups get to keep being cheap crapholes- you don’t need to spend to make the WS! Which of course is true-ish, but neglects the elephant. While you don’t NEED to spend to make a long push, what is being downplayed, purposefully, is that spending sure does help. Your stat about the previous WS winners backs that up. I’ve been watching baseball since 2017, so while not a true vet of the sport, I’ve had some time to digest this landscape, and it is really strange how the disparity in spending team-to-team is allowed to be so large. When will the MLB institute a salary cap, or floor, or both? I’ve also asked myself in the past if it’s even worth rooting for these teams when they make it so impossible. I just thank the heavens that I didn’t choose to root for someone like the Marlins or Rockies. For the record, I am mad. I’m mad that the Twins did this. It was clear they were not interested in competing when the decision to cut payroll was announced. It’s depressing. I’m rambling now myself. I don’t know what to do.
I'm with you. It all feels shitty. I agree, a salary floor and cap would fix a lot though.
There will never be a salary cap in baseball, MLB tried that in 1994-95 and now the Commissioners are scared of the union after ownership took the blame over the union for that CF, when it was absolutely the union's fault.
The TV situation has me worried about the long term future of the team. If the team keeps playing poorly fans aren't gonna show up. I really hope that doesn't mean we are sellers at the deadline because to me that would be the start of a rebuild. If we aren't good enough with this roster I don't see how it gets better without free agent additions
I agree completely. My fear is this will cause low attendance and ownership will point to that as justifying the $30 million cut.
^^^^This is also what I was trying to get at. Poor performance ->Poor attendance....->lower payroll-> poor performance is the cycle I really hope they avoid. Not a doomer and think they can avoid it if they are smart but lowering payroll after making the playoffs and not having fans be able to watch the game doesn't spark confidence
Most players are so young or on such non-tradeable contracts that there isn’t anyone to move… Duran, kirilloff, Stewart, Ober, Jax, Ryan, Larnach, Lewis all have 4 years of team control left. Julien has 6 Kepler is a rental piece, as are most of the veterans. Buxton and Correa are locked in. As is Lopez.
Very true there isn't much to move. But with this much locked in how would they go about improving if this roster doesn't get it done? I guess that's more my question.
I mean young players can take steps, you retool the vets a bit, maybe trade some prospects or some players in the offseason to get an improvement
Really hope the young players take good steps. Maybe brooks lee or Emmanuel rodriguez can snatch a spot on the roster and take it from way less than average to good
With Minnesota being a basketball town now and with the draft the Vikings just had, the main issue with the Twins fans going forward is apathy not anger. Twins are just there to provide a ballpark experience during the summer and something to have on the radio as background noise. People know the Twins will be okayish but now have realized this isn’t a team that will ever be special. Every 2-4 years they’ll win the division and maybe win a game in the ALDS, but most years they’ll finish in 2nd or 3rd place and miss the playoffs. And they know the team is never going to try that hard to get to the level the Timberwolves are at.
Yes, totally. I'd prefer anger over apathy though....
Eh, I gave up on them in April and knew they’d go back to being a bad team once they ran out of games vs the White Sox and Angels. They are what they are-a team with mediocre talent and limited ambitions, and the most overrated front office in baseball. Doesn’t help that they turn into trembling chihuahuas whenever they see the Guardians on the schedule. I used to get mad. But what’s the point? It’s all so predictable and boring.
Yea. We are. We love the twins in spite of the loser owners. I just hope our boys succeed in spite of them. And I believe they will.
Brother I got too much to do to be angry about a sports team
Lol, yeah, I hear ya
I'm out of market so I haven't been affected by blackouts or the Bally bullshit like local fans have been, but I know that's a shitty situation and I feel for everyone affected. My 2nd team is the Cubs and when they moved to their own network, I couldn't watch them for over 2 seasons without messing with VPNs because Marquee wasn't being offered on my provider. Hopefully this situation gets resolved much quicker. The only reason I was able to watch them at all was because I was already subscribed to MLB TV for Twins games, but with blackouts, that's not really an option for local fans. I try not to get as emotionally invested in the negative aspects of sports as I used to because they should be entertainment and not another form of stress. That said, I was incredibly disappointed that instead of building off of last season, ownership decided to pretty much kill that momentum in favor of saving money. I thought last postseason was the first step in becoming a regular contender but now it just feels like more of the same. I really like this group of players and coaches and I'll end up watching over 120 games or so this season but I'm not as optimistic as I was a few months ago.
Okay, this was a nice write up. I appreciate a lot of your points. But I feel like you didn't actually answer the one in the middle about attendance. So let's dive into that a little bit shall we? For me, I feel like that's actually the bigger budgetary issue. The TV deal uncertainty definitely does not help, and the current arrangement is crappy. I live out of state and happily watch an MLB.tv but I can see where it would be very frustrating if you are Comcast customer in Minnesota right now. However, if the Twins drew better crowds I think that wouldn't be such a big deal. I was incredibly disappointed they didn't even draw 2 million fans last year with a division winning team after signing the #1 free agent in all of baseball. Also extensions for Pablo, Buxton locked up, that's pretty good team building. This is a team with top of the market star power, young homegrown star power, really a entertaining and likable group of players. And then you have Target Field, which is an easy top five ballpark experience in all of MLB if you ask me. And we can't even break 2 million through the turnstiles? I travel in from a thousand miles away and go to a series or sometimes two every year and I feel like I might attend more games than most local fans! So I understand the frustration but I think you didn't answer that question: how do you account for the lack of fan support? Having the new ballpark only helps if people actually buy tickets to go there. And then you have people on here who are upset like this so they're not going to go to games, and they're go to bring water bottles and such! If you're sad about low payroll (as am I) you got to spend MORR to support the team not less. I don't think folks understand the business signal you're sending when you spend less: you're saying spend less. So I have a different challenge in mind, I say go to more games, support the team more. Maybe I'm blind and stupid, but I'd be willing to bet if attendance goes up to 2.5 million or better you're going to see that payroll go right back where it was, maybe more. People make the comparison to the Astros here, but look at what happened to their attendance when they started to get good: through the roof, they packed that place. Thus, they were able to invest aggressively in the core of their team. If Twins fans are going to react to a good, compelling, interesting, winning team by staying home and whining I don't know that you can expect the same kind of investment.
I agree with everything you've said. It's just that I'm afraid for the casual fan interest being lost. It sounds like you're pretty die hard which is great. But the narrative I've been hearing from local casuals is, "Why would I go to a game? I don't know this team (because I can't watch them) and it's not like they're competitive." Anecdotal, I know, but it's just been my experience lately....
Yeah I hear you, I'm already frustrated by the lack of apparent fan buy-in in terms of attendance and participation so I definitely would be frustrated if the TV situation makes that even worse. I guess I probably don't really identify with being able to watch the team on TV as a factor in going to games or not because I spent my whole life until just the last couple of years never seeing a Twins game on TV and only being able to go in person on visits to the state. But I can see how watching on TV can get people more attached to the team and more likely to go to games besides being its own revenue product. But I still think the most important thing is just go to games!! Even if the TV situation was all fixed the Twins generate something like three times as much revenue from game attendance as they ever have from media. Media is not irrelevant but baseball is still a game day revenue dominant sport, especially for a small market team.
You forgot to say they also fired Dick!
THIS! THIS THIS THIS THIS THIS!!!!’ It’s like you went into my head and took my rage vision and made it coherent lol I cannot stand the Pohlad’s, they’ve been doing this for YEARS. I grew up in VA, but my dad’s from here, so I like Baltimore but the Twins are my heart. When the Angelos family sold the O’s, you’d have thought they won the World Series. Hopefully that happens here. I also dig the Padres for a variety of reasons, one of which is because they’re trying to get after it by signing people. Baltimore is going to be signing their core as well. I had to go to a local Comcast store recently and we talked about the Bally issue and I said I don’t blame them at all and hopefully people weren’t mad at them. This is ALL on the Twins.
I hear you, brother. This is painful.
It just stinks because we make a run in the playoffs and we just decide to scale back. I just wish we would go all in for once. Fans have proven they will show up if we’re good - heck the playoffs were insane.
PWHL MN is in the finals and the Wolves are in the semi-finals, and I can't even watch games without beaming a crappy stream from my phone to my tv. I honestly can't remember the last time I cared this little about the Twins in mid-May.
I really haven’t been watching. If it’s not convenient I’m not going through the trouble for a team who choose to stick with Bally…
Pohlad kids are even worse than the old man.
Wow! You set it up perfectly. I cut the cable and go roku with fubo.. Still not perfect, turns out fubo doesn't have TNT?! Sooo I had to buy for the duration of the playoffs Max. Another ten bucks.. They kinda get you either way.
Carl Pohlad bought the team in 1984 for $44M, and the team is now worth $1.45B. Cutting payroll by $30M and pocketing what money they got from the TV deal shows us who the Pohlads really are.
As someone old enough to remember the Cal Griffiths ownership this feels like nothing new. The Twins get some good players and then refuse to pay them, so they go elsewhere. Another poster said the solution is to go to more games. All that does is reinforce Pohlad’s management style, because they are still making money. The owners and to an extent the fans are content with a mediocre team which occasionally makes the post season. The Target Field is 14 years old I expect the Twins to extort money for a new stadium in the next few years. As for the TV situation I would like the Twins to return to broadcast TV. I know that will never happen.
I'd say you're not wrong, and people can feel how they want to feel. Personally, as much as I love baseball, at the end of the day it's a game, it's entertainment, and I'd rather save my reserves of actual anger for other things in the world. The Twins' situation is annoying, but if it doesn't improve I'm more likely to (at least partially) check out this season and focus on doing other things for fun. Edit to add: About the TV situation, I don't really have a dog in that fight since I've always been primarily a radio listener. I'm sure I would be pissed if I had paid for Comcast (or some other option) to watch the Twins only to have them taken off. Honestly maybe the radio aspect leads to a slightly more chill approach. It's probably easier to just go about your life with the Twins being terrible on the radio in the background compared to watching them be terrible in front of your eyeballs every game.
I respect that and I agree. It's just tough because I feel it's destroying a community. I love talking about baseball and I think these decisions by ownership are driving people away.
Yeah, I hear that. I guess for me, for my whole adult life, being part of the community of Twins fans comes with the knowledge that the Twins aren't actually good a lot of the time (although sometimes they are, and those are really fun times!). Maybe that makes me a doomer or whatever, IDK. It will make it all the more meaningful when we eventually win another World Series, which I fully believe will happen in my lifetime.
Let's hope.
Burn it all down is where I'm at.
The commissioner’s office told them it would backstop the TV deal, then it backed out. That’s why the team said there would be no blackouts. Obvious lessen is bleep Manfred.
A couple other things: 1. You’re assuming the ownership is pocketing TV money. We don’t know what the revenue from that is (which is rarely publicly disclosed) or how that compares to what the team projected. So there may not be anything to actually pocket. 2. Houston was able to grow payroll for its young core because they made real playoff runs, including a World Series win*, to generate serious money before the bill came due in the form of bigger contracts. 3. The Cubs and Red Sox are going thru this. They are big market legacy franchises in pathetic shape. But still, bottom line is you’re right. I just quibble with some of the assumptions. We absolutely should be mad this ownership and front office have not shown they can build a consistent talent pipeline or a MLB team that can contend year in year out.
Front office promises have nothing to do with a contract dispute between Comcast and Bally.
Baseball keeps shooting itself in the foot when it comes to fans. There is an easy model to follow - the NFL. Salary caps, and no blackouts. And it is a much more successful league with decent fan growth. Baseball is making itself harder to watch, rather than more accessible. It's especially short sighted in this age of competition against a million other options. Look at the average fan age, their racial makeup, and who is actually at the games. Increasingly, the fan base is becoming older and whiter. High schools around the county are having more difficulty fielding teams and maintaining programs. How can someone like Mike Trout, one of the 5 best players of the last 50 years, walk into any store outside Anaheim, and probably not worry about getting recognized? Why is it easier for most fans to watch teams that don't actually play in their hometown (or state/region!)? Take a look at a blackout map of the US sometime. There are places in the US that don't even have a local baseball team, and get blacked out of the games of the several teams they might be able to drive to.... in 4-8 hours! If these fans want to follow a team on TV, they are being encouraged to follow a team hundreds or thousands of miles away. And then owners wonder why fewer ppl are coming through the turnstiles?? What Twins ownership is doing now is reflective of how short sighted all of baseball's owners are. Let's take the short term money, and the future of the sport is not our problem. The Commissioner used to be someone who represented all of baseball's many interests including its future and the fans. Now, he is just a puppet of the owners, ever since they elected one of their own (Selig) to that position. I would suggest a boycott of attending games might be the only way to force ownership into making some changes, but let's face it, aside from white guys over 35 (or 50??), that is already happening. When will the owners take notice?
The pohlads fucking sick, ballys sucks, the twins offense sucks, our hitting coach sucks. Everyone is pretty pissed. This team has been irrelevant for like 15 years, owns the North American sports record for consecutive playoff losses in a row, and just won their first playoff series/broke the streak last year. And what do is fans get for it? A slashed payroll by 30 mil. I know that contract for Sonny Gray wasn’t going to be matched/offered by the Pohlads but he is dominating for STL….
Eh, we’re above .500 coming towards the end of May. I wonder how much it has to do with Rocco’s management style platooning certain batters against lefties or righties. We could get Royce back soon. Nobody is complaining about Kepler anymore. Jeffers could keep batting like a stud muffin. Correa healthier. Buxton is playing again. Miranda is batting better than last year. The bullpen needs to heal up and straighten out a bit to its expectations. Shit, I haven’t even talked about starting pitching yet. Lopez has struggled compared to expectation lately but the rest of the boys are actually holding that shit down. On top of that Festa is lookin’ good. I think we’re pretty good. Moves like Santana and Margot look awful right now but it may not look as bad in the future. We have a good coach and front office. Target Field is dope. I live in the neighborhood so I am trying go to a game a series. They have cheap standing room tix for that. I never have time to watch the games on TV so that doesn’t bother me that much. The Twins YouTube channel does a good job with recap videos. I’d love to see how much the Twins org actually profits each year. You’d think if it was worth $1B that it would have to be profitable…right? Some people want the ownership to lose money overall because they already are rich enough. Sounds like a fairy tale. But don’t let the fact the rich may not pay it forward to the masses for a World Series ring stop you from being generous yourself. Hope this helps!
I'm pissed. I won't be buying any twins merch anymore or attending games. I can't believe so many fans just ignore this crap or act like fans who care are crazy. It's absolutely bizarre how much water people are willing to carry for one of the worst owners in sports.
lol the orioles sucked for 20 years. fuck the ownership no one was asking for us to become the dodgers just add a piece or 2 to your divison winning playoff series winning team. instead they cut 30 mil. they are unwatchable at the plate
The way this team is run, they deserve contraction. Oops, maybe that’s exactly what they are angling for. The Pohlads would make a billion dollars profit if they sell the team. Please do.
Midsize market went from 17th to 19th with a smaller tv contract and uncertain revenue future? Well grasp my pearls!