On Thursday night, after the Minnesota Twins dropped their series opener against the Tigers at Target Field, the Twins TV postgame show was interrupted by a group of fans, who gathered nearby the studio setup on the stadium concourse and began chanting “Sell the team” so loud that it audibly overwhelmed the broadcast.

It was impossible for analyst Tim Laudner to cogently get his thoughts out while competing with the sound of this angry chorus. I felt genuinely bad for him, and I commend Laudner and Katie Storm for handling a tough situation as professionally as they could. I don’t feel so bad, however, for the target of these boo-birds — an ownership group that completely brought this upon themselves. 

It’s not so much what they’ve done, but what they say. I’m sure that in the minds of the Pohlad family, there were good reasons for the payroll slash following the 2023 postseason breakthrough. I’m sure they have enduring confidence in the people running this team, and in their own ability to steer things in the right direction with support from a more engaged and invested set of minority partners. 

Fans just don’t wanna hear it. We’re tired of the endless stream of empty platitudes and meaningless corporate speak coming from this organization. For Joe Pohlad to come out and talk about how much they want to win, following a deadline (full of “baseball decisions”) that all but dashed such hopes for this year and next, rings hollow. It was transparently about money. His comments about the nature of this non-sale of the team are an affront to the intelligence of fans. It was transparently about money. 

We see what you’re doing. You’re not cute or slick. The more this ownership group tries to blow smoke and claim that “No actually, everything’s fine and this leadership is good,” the more resentment will fester from fans who care about this team, who care about the future of baseball in Minnesota.

What we saw erupt on Thursday’s postgame broadcast was not just frustration, but outright anger and disgust. It’s justified. If the Pohlads were surprised or taken aback by it, then maybe it’s a wake-up call they needed. Expecting any other reaction to Thursday’s news would hint at a delusional level of obliviousness, but then, that’s par for the course with this operation.

I like to think there is a way forward out of this, even if the team remains technically under Pohlad control. There is a world where the new limited partners are actually invested in the team’s success, rather than insisting upon it as unsubstantiated lip service. If these newcomers, minority stakeholders though they may be, are ousting Pohlad family holdovers who didn’t care, that could be a potentially substantial shift in the right direction. Massive debt coming off the books could lead to greatly increased spending flexibility, theoretically.

I hope that happens. I hope the chanting and the lamenting and the rancor come to a simmr. Not because I’m sympathetic for the Pohlads and the heat they’re getting, but because I’m sick of hearing about it. I’m sick of ownership being a central topic of conversation. I want to talk about the controllable things that really matter to winning baseball games: development, decision-making, performance. If this shakeup leads to ownership just getting out of the way and fading into the background again, that would be wonderful.

Unfortunately, on this and many other fronts, comments from the people in charge give us little reason for belief. The tone-deaf rambling from Joe Pohlad and Derek Falvey are only worsening sentiment around this organization and it’s morale-crushing course of action. But at this point I don’t think anyone really cares what either of one of them has to say anymore. 

Until we actually see something different, the Pohlad ownership will continue to vilify themselves and ensure they are the center of attention and angst in Twins territory. It only feels like a matter of time before fans are being escorted out of the stadium for slinging SELL t-shirts.

“Our fans are passionate. Our fans want to win. We have that in common — we want to win, too,” Pohlad told the Star Tribune when asked about the vocal criticism direct toward his billionaire bunch. “I’d rather have passionate fans than fans who are disengaged.” 

Better put some kind of action behind that claim or Joe is going to find his stated preference really put to the test.