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When Joe Pohlad took over as the new figurehead for ownership during the 2022-23 offseason, he talked a big game, with the organization positioning him as a bold leader who would usher in a bright new era of prestige for the Minnesota Twins brand. He seemed ready to back it up.
As the third-generation Pohlad settled into his new title and role, Minnesota's payroll rose to unprecedented heights, fueled in large part by the paradigm-shattering Carlos Correa signing. Meanwhile, the Twins were unveiling an ambitious and comprehensive rebrand, while also teasing big upgrades to Target Field, including a $30-million scoreboard expansion.
The message at the time was that the Twins were only getting started. "While he didn’t mention a specific number, Pohlad didn’t hesitate to suggest the Twins could increase payroll significantly if everything was properly aligned," wrote Dan Hayes in The Athletic at the time. In the article, Pohlad did not rule out the possibility of payroll eventually climbing into the $180-200 million range, putting Minnesota into another class of resource availability and market legitimacy.
In the ensuing 2023 season, a slow start stifled enthusiasm around the team, but things progressed brilliantly after the All-Star break, as the Twins rallied to a division title and snapped a two-decade postseason curse before a packed house at Target Field.
As luck would have it, their TV contract with the much-maligned Diamond Sports Group was reaching an end, making the Twins free agents in the broadcast arena, free to shop their rights around or bring them under their own umbrella. Team officials crowed about the opportunity to expand reach and access throughout Twins Territory, while also publicly promising to end blackouts.
Here's a quick recap of all that's happened since the Twins were eliminated from the playoffs by Houston last year:
- Derek Falvey openly stated the team's intention to substantially reduce spending, just days after one of the most exciting breakthroughs in the franchise's modern history, driven by a record payroll.
- The Twins followed through on this declaration to the extreme, slashing payroll by a whopping $35 million to drop into the bottom third of the league.
- At the same time, they ended up signing on for another year with Diamond Sports, in a decision clearly and solely motivated by money, rendering false and hollow their talk about fan access being the priority.
You can throw in some other questionable courses of action – e.g. unceremoniously parting ways with Dick Bremer in a manner that struck many as cold – but those are the big ones, from my view. Especially in tandem. Slashing payroll and pocketing the TV money (while sticking with a broadcast situation that the team already acknowledged as a raw deal for their fans) really felt to a lot of people like a middle finger extended in their direction, rather than an open hand of welcome. Who could blame them?
Now, it's gotten even worse. Last week, without any warning, Bally Sports North and other Diamond Sports RSNs went dark for Comcast and Xfinity customers, as the two sides evidently failed to reach agreement ahead of a May 1 deadline. Two huge, greedy, despised companies at war. As a byproduct, a massive share of the Twins' already-restricted audience lost their means of watching them.
In light of all those lofty proclamations about the vital importance of making their product available to a larger audience, the emergence of new barriers for willing, would-be paying customers to watch this baseball team almost feels like some kind of sick joke. Those proclamations were savvy, and correct! Yet, the Twins have betrayed these supposed beliefs in their every action, and they now find themselves embroiled in a disaster of their own making, damaging their brand in ways that are difficult to overstate.
Yes, someone like me can find an alternative. I did. I canceled my Xfinity subscription over the weekend and I'm now on board with Fubo TV, which seems fine. But the Twins were never at risk of losing me. They're at risk of losing people who lack the means to find a new solution, or who are so fed up with all this garbage that they don't even try to do so.
I think of restaurants and sports bars, which – I can say from experience – were already liable to have whatever out-of-market NBA or NHL game happened to be available on TV instead of the Twins, even when the broadcasts were easier to access. I think of people like my parents, who are big Twins fans but also longtime cable subscribers, and unlikely to make some drastic change over this. Guess they'll just dial back their investment.
I think of stories like the one below, from a Twitter acquaintance whose 87-year-old grandpa now suddenly has to figure out how he can watch the team at his assisted living community. It's sad.
These are all missed opportunities at best, and flagrant brand-building blunders at worst. Although I am one, it doesn't take a marketing professional to understand the dire long-term implications of this sort of audience gatekeeping, especially in a local market where competition for sports fans is fierce: The Timberwolves are making a thrilling postseason run, and the Vikings just drafted their quarterback of the future.
Look, I'm not unearthing any secret, groundbreaking revelations here. And that's where I end up utterly confused. Joe Pohlad is renowned for, as much as anything, his brand-building chops. His previous work in taking over Go Media was largely tied to this strength, despite business failures, even in his own words. "Go had a ton of successes in my opinion on the brand side. But the failures came from the business standpoint, from pivoting," Pohlad said in the aforementioned Hayes article.
Well, from a business standpoint, the Twins need to pivot. Clearly. They're fumbling that right now. But at the very least, they can get their situation straight from a messaging and branding standpoint. Your fans, and potential future fans, are everything. Stop antagonizing them! Is this billable business advice? Should I be charging?
Whatever advice this organization's leadership is receiving now, it doesn't seem very good. I'm not sure who felt that an out-of-touch shrug the shoulders ¯_(ツ)_/¯ would be received well as the team's spin on this Bally Sports travesty. "No role or voice in this matter"? Get real. Treating your audience as expendable is one thing; treating them as idiots is another.
I'm writing this not because I'm calling for heads to roll, or even because I want to single out any specific person for the complete debacle that has unfolded with this franchise. Joe Pohlad, Dave St. Peter, I don't care. Someone's gotta step up and mitigate the brand damage.
Notably, whoever is going to play a role in turning around this wayward ship, it won't be Meka Morris. Hired in 2021 as the organization's first-ever Chief Revenue Officer, and described by Forbes in a glowing feature last summer as "the woman in charge of selling [the Twins'] appeal," Morris quietly exited recently, taking a job in March as EVP/Revenue & Chief Business Officer (essentially the same title) for the Chicago Bears.
I'm not going to speculate on the reasons behind the departure of this executive who was seemingly viewed as a rising star. As far as I can tell, neither side has commented on the split publicly. But at the very least, it's yet another glaring example of the bright and confident vision laid out for this organization just a few years ago going by the wayside. Revenues are dropping, payroll is dropping, fans are pissed off, and everyone seems completely clueless and reactive in the way they're responding and communicating about it.
It's a real shame, at a time where the Twins should be capitalizing on all the excellent work this front office and this coaching staff and these players have done to generate energy and excitement. They deserve better.
We all deserve better. It's time for the Minnesota Twins – their ownership, their business side – to do better. Or find somebody who can.
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