BPro: Twins Are Not A "Small Market" Team

[spinowner]

 

Seattle gets Portland

Cincinnati gets Columbus and Kentucky

St. Louis gets Memphis

Detroit gets Michigan

Atlanta gets South Carolina, Alabama and Mississippi

The Twins get Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota and there isn't a lot of population outside of the Twin Cities in those states. 

 

If you are just looking at metro populations to make the small market case... you are starting from a bad spot. 

This is a good point that actually has to do with the topic of the thread. Google "map of favorite baseball teams" to see some cool maps and you'll see how limited the Twins are in terms of populated areas. A similar way to evaluate this is to find the Twins' radio affiliates. (It was on the Twins web site last year.) It's not hard to see why their TV and radio contract is on the small side.

[Vanimal46]

This is a good point that actually has to do with the topic of the thread. Google "map of favorite baseball teams" to see some cool maps and you'll see how limited the Twins are in terms of populated areas. A similar way to evaluate this is to find the Twins' radio affiliates. (It was on the Twins web site last year.) It's not hard to see why their TV and radio contract is on the small side.

It's annoying that it's difficult to stream the radio broadcast. I don't know if it's the same for all teams, but I do remember multiple times last summer where I downloaded the TuneIn app, searched for 96.3 FM, and I could never get the game, just music.

[Riverbrian]

 

It's annoying that it's difficult to stream the radio broadcast. I don't know if it's the same for all teams, but I do remember multiple times last summer where I downloaded the TuneIn app, searched for 96.3 FM, and I could never get the game, just music.

 

It's the same for all teams... MLB doesn't allow it.  

 

They'd like you to purchase the internet audio from them. 

 

If you do happen across it somewhere it's because the radio station made a mistake. 

 

 

[beckmt]

Twins as noted above have always paid there own players.  Puckett also being along with Mauer the examples. 

Not having a domed stadium  will not hurt now, but will be a factor 10 years from now.  I know of places that have quit sending buses to the Twins because of the bad weather fear. 

Foxsports makes good money because they are the only game in town for the sports teams and while they cannot totally dictate the price paid, they can certainly put a lid on it.  Until all the major sports teams in this area put together their own network, this will not change.

Baseball is still a funny game,  with the demise of PED's the average player will be done in their early thirties(this is true of all sports).  So FA is not all a good deal if the average player hits it 2 - 3 years before they really decline.  That is why a number of midmarket teams have issues when FA contracts went bad(Cleveland being a prime example, not being able to add a big bat or two because of the Borne and Swisher contracts). 

Pitchers seem to last a little longer, but with the changes in innings pitched, most starters throw a lot less pitches than they did even 10 years ago.  Twins have done better than most teams as they can afford to eat a couple of years of one or two bad contracts if they have to (Nolasco may be a prime example).

I as a result can buy a conservative approach of letting talent develop and having windows, but all this may change with the next CBA.

[Otto von Ballpark]

The other thing the Pohlads bring to the table is uncommon loyalty, which does bring stability but is balanced out by the same people keeping the same positions, perhaps longer than they should, and making it difficult for many new ideas to penetrate, especially initially.

Uh, contraction? I don't think there was uncommon loyalty with the Pohlads, but rather as long as a conservative budget was followed, they didn't really care who ran the show.

[Otto von Ballpark]

I agree that the Twins biggest disadvantage almost certainly lies with the TV revenue. However I dont know that Victory Sports would be a great boon. The team clearly didn't do their homework, they created this station and immediately began demanding ESPN rates from the distributors despite only having one program that anyone would care about, and only during the warm months. How could they not have reached agreements with distributors prior to creating their station? They should have known their demands would not be met.

 

Additionally they must have set the price point only slightly above their expenses because they didn't negotiate lower rates, they just abruptly quit the station and crawled back to FSN. I would think that meant they were going to have to profit almost exclusively on ad revenue. I think the team got in way over their head and even if it caught on, it was bound to be a disaster.

 

But back to the Twins crawling back to FSN; a month into their season they only had something like 10% of their marketing area able to view games. They came to FSN hat in hand, I think there's no way FSN didn't bend them over. I've never heard of a generous TV exec and the Twins had zero leverage. The Twins aren't getting anything close to what other teams currently get. They need this TV deal over ASAP.

Sounds like the broadcasting version of Don't Beaver, the Marty Cordova cancer kid ad, contraction, etc. Holy cow the Twins were bad at chasing a buck.

[Major League Ready]

Fanaticism is interesting.  It’s perfectly fine for a player to get every last dollar they can in free agency.  But an owner should invest hundreds of millions and act as a non-profit.  Let’s put this in perspective.  It would take the average American 2,500 years to earn as much as Cespedes will over the 3 year contract he just signed.  The deals Price and Grienke signed are roughly equivalent to 7,000 years work for the average American. 

 

Those of you who promote the idea that a team should be willing to operate at break-even because it is prestigious or because of tax breaks have not thought that idea through.  The only difference that would make is that the players would make even more.  Every team would spend more and no team would gain any advantage.  Therefore, if this is your position, you need to modify it to the Pohlads and the twins should be the only team or one of a  very small group of teams willing to ignore the most basic principal of any business. 

 

BTW … Even if they were willing to operate at break-even, they would still be a substantial disadvantage when compared to the top revenue teams.

[drjim]

 

Uh, contraction? I don't think there was uncommon loyalty with the Pohlads, but rather as long as a conservative budget was followed, they didn't really care who ran the show.

 

I really disagree. They find people they like at the top positions and stick with them.

 

And actually the old man made frequent changes at first, but that shifted once MacPhail/Kelly came on board.

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

Fanaticism is interesting.  It’s perfectly fine for a player to get every last dollar they can in free agency.  But an owner should invest hundreds of millions and act as a non-profit.  Let’s put this in perspective.  It would take the average American 2,500 years to earn as much as Cespedes will over the 3 year contract he just signed.  The deals Price and Grienke signed are roughly equivalent to 7,000 years work for the average American. 

 

Those of you who promote the idea that a team should be willing to operate at break-even because it is prestigious or because of tax breaks have not thought that idea through.  The only difference that would make is that the players would make even more.  Every team would spend more and no team would gain any advantage.  Therefore, if this is your position, you need to modify it to the Pohlads and the twins should be the only team or one of a  very small group of teams willing to ignore the most basic principal of any business. 

 

BTW … Even if they were willing to operate at break-even, they would still be a substantial disadvantage when compared to the top revenue teams.

 

There is something about this discussion that's amusing.  I wholeheartedly agree here. I have no problems with the Pohlads wanting to make money on the Twins, just as I have no problems with the players wanting top dollar as well. At the end of the day, it's a business.

 

My main gripe though has more to do with asking the public to subsidize said business and claiming poor in order to do it.  The Twins weren't bankrupt during the 2000s... yeah, they couldn't compete with the Yankees or really most teams (kind of like what the Royals are going through right now), but they were still profitable.  Now, like everyone agrees, this is a mid-market team... perhaps leaning towards below average on the bell curve, but still quite close to the midpoint. 

[Boom Boom]

Lots of implications here about how insidious the Pohlads have been in chasing a buck. I think the truth is somewhat simpler than that.

 

Their front office consists of mostly lifers who have been around the team forever. They are stuck in the same habits they had when they were under the Metrodome roof. You can take the Pohlads out of the Dome, but you can't take the Dome out of the Pohlads.

[Mike Sixel]

I have never claimed they should not make money. I don't know if anyone here has, but they might have.I would prefer that sports not be subsidized any more. I have claimed that in selling the stadium, they made certain "promises" about payroll that I do not believe have been met. I could be wrong about that, we don't have their internal numbers, but from public numbers, they seem to be short on payroll. They have said they go year to year, so that money has been "pocketed" by the owners, or otherwise spent on the team, but NOT to make the team better during those lighter payroll years.

 

As a FAN (short for fanatic, someone that IRRATIONALLY cares about something that should not matter at all), that bothers me. If it doesn't bother you, that's fine with me. I'm not trying to change your mind (other than hoping you'll hop on the "no more subsidies" bandwagon).

[ThejacKmp]

 

1. I don't believe Pohlad ever lost money, would never claim otherwise - especially since pubically stated he wanted to run the team in such a way that wouldn't lose money. And I don't even think they said they were losing money, only that without new revenue they couldn't compete (which was also proven false in the aughts).

 

Though I absolutely believe pre-Target Field they were a "small market" team in the sense that they were in the bottom 5 of revenue.

 

2. I don't necessary disagree, but also not my money.

 

3. Again, not my money.

 

And Im not sure on the solution you offered, nothing would gum up an industry more than putting under public control.

 

1) "Frustrated that no stadium was forthcoming and that the team was losing money, Mr. Pohlad threatened to sell the team in 1997, and in 2001, he offered to sell the Twins to his fellow major league owners and fold the franchise." That's from his obituary. I could get you a ton of other times that he claimed the Twins were losing money - but refused to open the books to prove it.

 

The Packers are publicly owned and they do depressingly well.

 

We're not talking about having shareholders run it - the Twins organization would still have a GM and the same staff and run the same. The only difference would be that the books would be wide open and any profits received from public spending on stadiums would go to those who coughed up the money. It would actually have been easier to get a competitive Twins stadium built if the taxpayers knew that it was an investment in the long term profits of the team.

[DaveW]

 

I have never claimed they should not make money. I don't know if anyone here has, but they might have.I would prefer that sports not be subsidized any more. I have claimed that in selling the stadium, they made certain "promises" about payroll that I do not believe have been met. I could be wrong about that, we don't have their internal numbers, but from public numbers, they seem to be short on payroll. They have said they go year to year, so that money has been "pocketed" by the owners, or otherwise spent on the team, but NOT to make the team better during those lighter payroll years.

 

As a FAN (short for fanatic, someone that IRRATIONALLY cares about something that should not matter at all), that bothers me. If it doesn't bother you, that's fine with me. I'm not trying to change your mind (other than hoping you'll hop on the "no more subsidies" bandwagon).

Yeah, I don't think anyone has said they shouldn't make money, in fact, they could still make a ton of money AND help the team compete by loosening up the purse strings ever so gently. Instead once again some folks who don't agree with this try to get on a high horse with some silly "Well its their business what they shouldn't make money?" nonsense. They could raise payroll 10% and still be making plenty of bank. (Not to mention the fact that the value of the club goes up each and every year anyways....) Just think of how much money the Pohlads would have missed out on if Carl and Buds scheme to contract went through!
 

 

[DaveW]

 

 

1) "Frustrated that no stadium was forthcoming and that the team was losing money, Mr. Pohlad threatened to sell the team in 1997, and in 2001, he offered to sell the Twins to his fellow major league owners and fold the franchise." That's from his obituary. I could get you a ton of other times that he claimed the Twins were losing money - but refused to open the books to prove it.

 

The Packers are publicly owned and they do depressingly well.

 

We're not talking about having shareholders run it - the Twins organization would still have a GM and the same staff and run the same. The only difference would be that the books would be wide open and any profits received from public spending on stadiums would go to those who coughed up the money. It would actually have been easier to get a competitive Twins stadium built if the taxpayers knew that it was an investment in the long term profits of the team.

Yeah, it's pretty laughable to think at anytime in the 90's and 2000's Pohlad was actually LOSING money on the team. HAHAHAHA

[drjim]

 

Yeah, I don't think anyone has said they shouldn't make money, in fact, they could still make a ton of money AND help the team compete by loosening up the purse strings ever so gently. Instead once again some folks who don't agree with this try to get on a high horse with some silly "Well its their business what they shouldn't make money?" nonsense. They could raise payroll 10% and still be making plenty of bank. (Not to mention the fact that the value of the club goes up each and every year anyways....) Just think of how much money the Pohlads would have missed out on if Carl and Buds scheme to contract went through!
 

 

I would build on this by saying that if the Twins had been good from 2011-14 they would be making significantly more money, even if the payroll was $10-30 million (or more) higher. I don't think that is really that debatable. An underrated aspect of what happened is how much they got crushed with season tickets and, more importantly, corporate sponsorship because they went in the tank.

 

The debate of course is whether spending that much more money would have made much of a difference.  I've always been more of a skeptic on that front. Talk of "payroll promises" and the like is fine, but really it is just about winning right? Other than maybe Dodgers fans, every fanbase complains about payroll always, but winning certainly mutes it a little bit.

[tobi0040]

 

Fanaticism is interesting.  It’s perfectly fine for a player to get every last dollar they can in free agency.  But an owner should invest hundreds of millions and act as a non-profit.  Let’s put this in perspective.  It would take the average American 2,500 years to earn as much as Cespedes will over the 3 year contract he just signed.  The deals Price and Grienke signed are roughly equivalent to 7,000 years work for the average American. 

 

Those of you who promote the idea that a team should be willing to operate at break-even because it is prestigious or because of tax breaks have not thought that idea through.  The only difference that would make is that the players would make even more.  Every team would spend more and no team would gain any advantage.  Therefore, if this is your position, you need to modify it to the Pohlads and the twins should be the only team or one of a  very small group of teams willing to ignore the most basic principal of any business. 

 

BTW … Even if they were willing to operate at break-even, they would still be a substantial disadvantage when compared to the top revenue teams.

 

I think we get back to the definition of breakeven.  On a cash basis, the last few years they could have had a payroll about $20M higher and "broke even". If you factor in franchise value appreciation, they could have been about 100M more ever year.  The franchise continues to rise in value at a rate significantly higher than almost any other asset class. Stock market, bond market, metals, etc.  It is a recession proof business. 

 

Heck, a guy like George Steinbrennar started with some money, but his net worth was almost entirely based on the Yankees rising in value.  He bought the team for $8.8M.  The team was worth $1.6B when he died, but his net worth at the time of his death was actually $1.1B.  The gap relates to debt he has on the team.

 

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

I really disagree. They find people they like at the top positions and stick with them.

 

And actually the old man made frequent changes at first, but that shifted once MacPhail/Kelly came on board.

How does that disprove my point?  Once they found affordable conservative budget followers to run baseball operations, the Pohlads were hands off in that department.  I'm not sure that suggests great loyalty as much as it suggests that conservative budget-following is their top and perhaps only priority in assembling their baseball ops team.

 

I am sure that they have grown fond of Gardy, TR, and others over the years, but it's very hard to separate that friendly familiarity from the core reason they hired those guys in the first place.  (Of course, TR, Gardy, Molitor, and others *within* the baseball ops department have demonstrated loyalty to players and other employees time and again, but that's not really coming from the Pohlads, who once the leadership was in place and the budget expectations set, have been hands off.)

 

The Pohlads certainly didn't always display great loyalty in their stadium fight, contraction offer, TV/radio contracts, etc.

[drjim]

To put it another way, I think the Twins had plans in good faith to maintain a payroll in $120-130 mil range, give or take a couple mil, in the time following the opening of Target Field. But with this plan was also a thought they would maintain the relative competitiveness of the aughts. A complete organizational collapse can change things a little, as it should.

[drjim]

 

How does that disprove my point?  Once they found affordable conservative budget followers to run baseball operations, the Pohlads were hands off in that department.  I'm not sure that suggests great loyalty as much as it suggests that conservative budget-following is their top and perhaps only priority in assembling their baseball ops team.

 

I am sure that they have grown fond of Gardy, TR, and others over the years, but it's very hard to separate that friendly familiarity from the core reason they hired those guys in the first place.  (Of course, TR, Gardy, Molitor, and others *within* the baseball ops department have demonstrated loyalty to players and other employees time and again, but that's not really coming from the Pohlads, who once the leadership was in place and the budget expectations set, have been hands off.)

 

The Pohlads certainly didn't always display great loyalty in their stadium fight, contraction offer, TV/radio contracts, etc.

 

I would say they found competent people and let them do their work, didn't meddle, and stuck by them. You can certainly interpret a different way.

[DaveW]

 

To put it another way, I think the Twins had plans in good faith to maintain a payroll in $120-130 mil range, give or take a couple mil, in the time following the opening of Target Field. But with this plan was also a thought they would maintain the relative competitiveness of the aughts. A complete organizational collapse can change things a little, as it should.

But they were competitive last year....one would think now would be a good time to get into that payroll range if they actually were ever serious about it (methinks they were not, and were just lying to the good folks of Minnesota...wouldn't be the first time)

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

Fanaticism is interesting.  It’s perfectly fine for a player to get every last dollar they can in free agency.  But an owner should invest hundreds of millions and act as a non-profit.  Let’s put this in perspective.  It would take the average American 2,500 years to earn as much as Cespedes will over the 3 year contract he just signed.  The deals Price and Grienke signed are roughly equivalent to 7,000 years work for the average American.

But players are employees, who often started their baseball careers making less than the average American.  For a lot of players who don't hit the FA jackpot, they return to average American earnings when their playing career is over.

 

Ownership generally comes into the game already millionaires/billionaires, if not corporate conglomerates backed by a group of millionaires/billionaires, and exist in that state in perpetuity.  Not really that hard to make a distinction between the two.

[tobi0040]

 

But they were competitive last year....one would think now would be a good time to get into that payroll range if they actually were ever serious about it (methinks they were not, and were just lying to the good folks of Minnesota...wouldn't be the first time)

 

I just think this is so unfair.  They added 3-4 relievers on minor league deals and two former Twins OF to minor league deals as well.

[tobi0040]

 

I would say they found competent people and let them do their work, didn't meddle, and stuck by them. You can certainly interpret a different way.

Terry strkes me as a guy who despite his nice salary, is still clipping coupons.  That is not an insult. I don't think that makes him a bad person.  But if you were a penny pinching owner, that is the type of guy you would want running the club.  He is not going to be complaining every year to spend more.  He will know the budget and enjoy the game of trying to find diamonds in the rough.

[Otto von Ballpark]

 

I would say they found competent people and let them do their work, didn't meddle, and stuck by them. You can certainly interpret a different way.

I'll dispute that they "stuck by them" in any meaningful way.  Why do owners make changes in baseball ops?  Because they're losing money or they aggressively want to win.  The Pohlads have never experienced either of those conditions, so they never had any reason to meddle in baseball ops.

 

I'm not sure why we should give them extra credit for baseball ops "loyalty" when they have simply retained employees who have 100% satisfied the goals of their employment.  Particularly when they've fallen well short of demonstrating "loyalty" in their dealings with local governments, fans, and broadcasters in the stadium/contractions/broadcast arenas.

[Platoon]

So to say all the money was pocketed since Target Field is indeed inaccurate. Should more be spent on payroll? Probably, and I think we'll see it as young core starts getting paid. My hope is that you are correct. But sadly I have no idea what would make that hope realistic. Short of a major change in the FO, what would make anyone think the Twins are going to start shelling out truly competitive cash? I don't have to list the reasons Mauer is an abberation to this, they are well documented. If a Buxton, Sano, or Berrios reaches the level of success their talent suggests, there is nothing in Twins History to suggest that the Twins will make a realistic bid to keep their services when free agency rears its attractive head.

[Platoon]

Terry strkes me as a guy who despite his nice salary, is still clipping coupons.  That is not an insult. I don't think that makes him a bad person.  But if you were a penny pinching owner, that is the type of guy you would want running the club.  He is not going to be complaining every year to spend more.  He will know the budget and enjoy the game of trying to find diamonds in the rough.

Some say, with I am sure a degree of speculation, that the lack of this trait led to Bill Smiths demise.

[tobi0040]

 

So to say all the money was pocketed since Target Field is indeed inaccurate. Should more be spent on payroll? Probably, and I think we'll see it as young core starts getting paid.

My hope is that you are correct. But sadly I have no idea what would make that hope realistic. Short of a major change in the FO, what would make anyone think the Twins are going to start shelling out truly competitive cash? I don't have to list the reasons Mauer is an abberation to this, they are well documented. If a Buxton, Sano, or Berrios reaches the level of success their talent suggests, there is nothing in Twins History to suggest that the Twins will make a realistic bid to keep their services when free agency rears its attractive head.

 

You don't think Terry Ryan and Jay-Z will be enjoying a nice dinner at Manny's and discussing the 10 year, $300M contract for Miguel Sano?

 

The mental picture of this is truly priceless.

 

[Jham]

 

But players are employees, who often started their baseball careers making less than the average American.  For a lot of players who don't hit the FA jackpot, they return to average American earnings when their playing career is over.

 

Ownership generally comes into the game already millionaires/billionaires, if not corporate conglomerates backed by a group of millionaires/billionaires, and exist in that state in perpetuity.  Not really that hard to make a distinction between the two.

 

Not to mention the fact that the real "profit" for a team comes when the team is sold.  Since Pohlad purchased the team, the team got a public funded stadium, a new TV Deal, league-wide profit sharing with no requirement that shared profits be reinvested in payroll, probably a budding Korean fan base.  Forbes has the Twins as the 12th most valuable team in baseball worth an estimated $490 mil.  In 2001, Pohlad offered to sell the team for $150 million.  He's "made" $340 million in 15 years by just breaking even.  Of course, the Pohlads typically do better than breaking even...

 

[DaveW]

 

You don't think Terry Ryan and Jay-Z will be enjoying a nice dinner at Manny's and discussing the 10 year, $300M contract for Miguel Sano?

 

The mental picture of this is truly priceless.

"Hey Jay, do you mind if I call you Jay? Yeah, so this is a little awkward, Mr. Pohlad has a cap on "entertainment/business" dinners at $45 a head, do you mind picking up the rest?"

[drjim]

 

I just think this is so unfair.  They added 3-4 relievers on minor league deals and two former Twins OF to minor league deals as well.

 

Of course this will never be resolved on a board, but I would counter this by saying it wasn't a lack of payroll space that stopped them from signing a reliever, it was a dislike of the contract it would have taken.