I've been a Twins fan since the mid-70's and have appreciated the entirety of Twins history. I've spent most of my adult life, since the early 80's, living in Iowa and putting up with a mix of Cubs/Sox/Cards/Royals fans in that order. I would say the Twins are probably the number two followed team in Iowa behind the Cubs. The only radio station I'm aware of in Iowa that has consistently been a Twins affiliate is the AM station out of Mason City. Over the years I've listened to WCCO, Mason City and the Twins affiliate out of Yankton, SD which seems to have the best reception wherever I go in Iowa. The local ESPN affiliate in Des Moines carried the Twins in 2010 and 2011. I don't believe it was a difficult decision for them to back out of their affiliation after last year. They didn't pick up another major league team, they simply added some high school baseball to their schedule.

As of today, driving around Des Moines in the afternoon and realizing the Twins were playing I went to tune into the game on the radio. I first checked 570 out of Yankton and discovered they were not carrying this afternoon's game and instead were following their normal weekday afternoon routine, a good dose of farm related radio. I've known Yankton to do this in the past. I then turned the dial to 1300 KGLO out of Mason City. I was quite surprised to hear Rush Limbaugh's voice. Apparently, Mason City's radio management has decided that as of August 1 the Twins are so pathetic that listeners would rather listen to Limbaugh even though they have been a long time and dedicated Twins affiliate. Finally, I attempted to tune into 1500 out of the cities which I knew would be an almost impossibility to pick up. Sure enough, no signal. So, as of August 1, 2012 there was no way to catch the Twins on radio in the largest market in a neighboring state and within the definite imprint of "Twins Territory".

The Front Office and others in charge had better realize that there is a slow but steady degradation of fan base. My fear is that it's going to get much worse before it gets better. Other observations?

I live in SE Iowa and Yankton never carries afternoon games, even when they were winning division titles

I've had similar expereinces with Mason City... afternoon games aren't generally carried.

Living in Cedar Rapids, we're in a similar dead zone. The only MLB radio carried is the ESPN Radio affiliate, which carries many, but not all, of the WSox games. I subscribe to MLB.tv, even though the entire state is subject to blackout for all 6 MLB teams in surrounding states. The upside to that is that it comes with MLB AtBat, which allows me to bring in Twins radio broadcasts on my smartphone (if I'm in out and about) and on the computer (if I'm home).

I'm hopeful that the local Class A team in CR might switch from their Angels affiliation to the Twins next year. If that should happen, there's a decent chance we start seeing a bit more media interest in the Twins in eastern Iowa anyway.