{"id":249909,"date":"2025-08-15T15:33:16","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T15:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/249909\/"},"modified":"2025-08-15T15:33:16","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T15:33:16","slug":"joe-pohlads-comments-on-non-sale-of-twins-are-an-affront-to-fans-intelligence-twins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/249909\/","title":{"rendered":"Joe Pohlad’s Comments on Non-Sale of Twins Are an Affront to Fans’ Intelligence – Twins"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tOn Wednesday, the Pohlads announced they will remain the principal owners of the Minnesota Twins, selling only a minority stake in the team. Joe Pohlad opened his remarks, as quoted in Phil Miller\u2019s Star Tribune piece<\/a>, by saying, \u201cI don\u2019t think we could have imagined a better outcome than where we landed.\u201d For a fanbase that has spent nearly a year hoping for new leadership, new philosophies, and an ownership group willing to invest more aggressively in winning, this is a slap in the face. It’s tone-deaf at best and deliberately insulting at worst, as if we are all supposed to smile and nod at the idea that this was the best possible result.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tPohlad\u2019s entire interview with the paper was filled with the kind of corporate speak that pretends everything is fine, even when it clearly is not. He spoke as though keeping control was a universally positive development, praising \u201calignment\u201d with the new minority partners and expressing faith in the \u201cfuture of baseball in Minnesota.\u201d It’s empty PR fluff, designed to paper over the reality that nothing meaningful has changed; the same ownership group is still in charge; and the fans who wanted a new voice have been strung along for months. The expectation seems to be that we will all just buy whatever he is selling.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tOn the trade deadline fire sale, Pohlad claimed the decision to deal 10 players on July 31 \u201ctook him by surprise\u201d and that the moves \u201chad little to do with saving money\u201d and were \u201cprimarily baseball decisions.\u201d That is simply not credible. In addition to the other nine trades (which were likely financially motivated as well), the Carlos Correa<\/a> trade was a pure salary dump, the very definition of a move made for financial reasons. Multiple reports say<\/a> it was ownership, not Derek Falvey, who pushed the trade across the finish line. To tell fans this was \u201cprimarily\u201d about baseball is to assume we are too gullible to connect the dots.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tHe also addressed criticism by saying that being booed is \u201cpart of the role\u201d and that he would \u201crather have passionate fans than fans who are disengaged.\u201d That is not just tone-deaf; it’s a lie. This fanbase is already incredibly disengaged, as evidenced by the Twins being on pace for the lowest attendance in Target Field history this season, a pace set long before this ownership news. Saying boos mean all is well ignores the fact that many fans are not booing; they are simply not showing up.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tThen came perhaps the most outrageous claim, that the Twins have taken on \u201csignificant debt,\u201d up to $400 million, since the summer of 2020. This from a franchise that receives lucrative national media rights money, revenue sharing, and has run average to below-average payrolls for years. We are supposed to believe that, somehow, they have lost nearly half a billion dollars in four seasons. It defies logic. And Pohlad\u2019s follow-up only made it worse:\n<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAs far as I\u2019m aware, that debt was not a hindrance in this process\u2026 but with this transaction, we\u2019re going to be paying that debt down,” he said. In this context, \u201cprocess\u201d meant selling the team in full, and claiming that the debt was not an issue in doing so is just not true. It’s clear the Pohlads were seeking extra money beyond a reasonable valuation, so they could pay off that debt and still walk away with the payday they wanted. The fact that he frames this as if it had no impact on the outcome is yet another example of how little regard this ownership has for fans\u2019 ability to see through the spin.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the end, the most disappointing part is not just that bad owners are staying put. It is that they are doing it while acting like Twins fans are too naive to see through the contradictions, spin, and corporate word salad. We were promised change. Instead, we are told this is the best possible outcome, that money is no object, and that ownership is as committed to winning as we are. Their words say one thing, their actions say another, and they expect us to believe them, anyway. That’s not just frustrating. It is insulting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Wednesday, the Pohlads announced they will remain the principal owners of the Minnesota Twins, selling only a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":249910,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2388],"tags":[5,977,978,822,60,3190,4,169,975,976,148],"class_list":{"0":"post-249909","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-minnesota-twins","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-blog","10":"tag-forum","11":"tag-minnesota","12":"tag-minnesota-twins","13":"tag-minnesotatwins","14":"tag-mlb","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-rumors","17":"tag-schedule","18":"tag-twins"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115033512793102575","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249909"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249909\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}