rdehring

Thanks, old nurse. That's a lot of information. And as you said, not totally clear what is happening. A couple things that popped out to me were: a) The Twins had EBITDA of about $10,000,000 in 2018; it makes sense to borrow money for certain stadium costs as the interest expense reduces net local revenue; and c) after all is said and done they pool about 48% of net local revenue. And maybe best of all, the Yankees wrote out a check for over $160,000,000. I like that.

Over, under, over, under, over. Now lets hope we have a chance to find out!

Thanks for linking that old nurse. But it is really puzzling. It says that pooling local media revenue had been contemplated, but never enacted. Then at the end, it says 48% of local revenues are pooled with each team getting 3.3%...which was over a hundred million in 2018. Not certain what to believe.

Prior to 2011 net local media was pooled at the rate of 31% with all teams sharing. This continues, however, I don't know the exact percentage since 2011. I have read articles mentioned that it approaches half...don't know if that is factual. I understand the definition of "net local revenue" is also somewhat ambiguous.

I don't know if the intent was Eddie bashing, diehard. But I do know that he played through significant injuries the last two years, yet, when Matt failed to mention this while stressing his second half results how else can we read it? Interesting question, Matt. Fact is as pointed out above he is who he is. Personally, he has been a favorite of mine since I closely followed his battle with Sano for the Appy League home run title however many years ago. With that said, he likely would become even better if he could accomplish what you suggest. I pray that we will have the opportunity to see Eddie play in the not distant future. As for 2021 and beyond, with all the young talent so close I don't have a clue how management will maximize the return to the Twins, but it is a nice problem to have.

Actually a very good article, Seth. And hopefully, both sides will focus on making it as safe as possible and be reasonable regarding the dollars. All the other changes related to the DH, where they play, etc. are minor. As for the dollars, hopefully, the league will forget about the 50-50 revenue sharing idea and focus on working with the players to get some type of reasonable (to both sides) percentage of each player's per game contractual salary. Fifty percent would be too low for the players and 100% would be too high for the owners. But somewhere in between there is a percentage that both sides can accept and live with. Hopefully, they can get this settled and get to work at all the other things that have to happen to get players on the field.

I read somewhere a few years ago, may have been a recap of the CBA, that local media revenues were shares. Think the percentage was 31%, but that was a long time to remember. Also didn't understand what the definition of local media revenue was.

I read somewhere that the decision had been made to cancel the minor league season, just hadn't been announced. It is my understanding that each team would have a 30-man active roster and something like a 20 man taxi squad...don't know if that is the term the league is using or was from whomever wrote the article. That would include the extra 10 players from the 40-man plus another 10. Assume those last 10 would be most of their top prospects who are near being ready...guys like Rooker, Kirilloff, Larnach, Jeffers, Lewis, and some AA and AAA pitchers. Didn't talk about playing games, however, expect they would play a lot of games vs. the Red Sox who are down the street.

Lots of reasons to play in the home parks with several mentioned above. I expect travel, both time and cost, is a factor that both management and the players should like. Some of the other reasons why all the teams going to Florida/Arizona don't work is weather. Teams aren't going to want to be playing outdoors in Arizona in the summer. And look at the problems the Miracle (I refuse to use that new name) have in July/August with rainouts. If you are dealing with a tight schedule, can't have a couple rainouts every week in late summer. Plus, doesn't the plan include having the 20-man taxi squad playing/working out at their spring training sites? Add the fact that a lot of the vets already have homes in the home market and it does make sense.

Agree 100% that baseball needs better revenue sharing than the current situation. What is it right now, something like 30% of local media gets pooled? Does anyone know the exact terms and what is included?

Great comment, diehard. But there is one point in which I believe you are wrong. There will be no profits in baseball this year. What the owners are attempting to do is reduce their losses. Every action they are taking deals with this, such as reducing the draft to five rounds with 90% of the signing bonuses deferred for a year or two. That doesn't change the accrued loss for this year, but it does save each team several million dollars of cash-flow. I think they are approaching it in the wrong manner and should be negotiating what percentage of their regular game day salary each player receives. That is much easier for the players to get their hands around. Each player would know what he was playing for if the offer was 67% of his normal pay versus 50% of whatever the total revenue is. Expect that is where they will end, hopefully, it won't be too bloody to get there.

You may call them greedy bastards. I expect the truth is that they are fighting for their survivals and for most, baseball is a small part of it. The Pohlad Companies have a major interest in many businesses. Two of the largest are United Properties and auto dealerships. Has anyone checked how many cars have been sold of late? Well, in Minnesota it is either none or very few. No one knows when those businesses will return to normal, whatever normal in the future is. Another major company is United Properties. Do you know that United has a major investment in senior housing? With most of the deaths in Minnesota coming from senior, nursing and assisted living housing, they are faced with a nightmare working to combat the virus attacking and killing many of their residents [i don't know if any of these have occurred in housing owned by UP]. Regardless of any deaths, the costs they are facing are huge as they battle these outbreaks in this type of housing. As for the rest of United Properties holdings, don't know how many tenants in commercial buildings aren't paying rent, but it doesn't take many to turn a profit into a loss. As for their hotels, expect they are closed with no income and lots of continuing expenses. That's the world those greedy bastards are in today. Thanks to Sconnie, we know that their average ticket price last year was $57. If they have zero fans in the stands during the last half of the normal season they would lose more than a 1,000,000 fans. So their revenue will be reduced by at least $57,000,000 for those 41 games. That doesn't take into consideration the other revenue related to those games that will also be lost, such as concessions. Yes, they won't have their normal game day expenses, however, they will have a lot of new expenses related to dealing with the virus and keeping the players as safe as possible. I believe I have seen that their revenue last year was around $250,000,000...someone can get this exact number. So half a season would have been $125,000,000. The $57,000,000 plus other game day income is probably at least half of their normal revenue. I don't know how to respond to those who believe it is realistic, much less fair, to expect them to lose half of their revenue yet pay 100% of their largest cost, player salaries. Like every small, medium and large company in America, the Pohlad Companies are fighting a battle to both deal with the effects of the virus as well as the survival of their businesses. I pray that they and the other owners will be realistic in dealing with the players. However, the players also have to understand that the world has changed and be fair in their dealings with the owners. If neither side is prepared to be reasonable, we won't have baseball. Personally, I am running out of books to read and really want to turn on the tv and see the Twins play whomever.

Then why are arguing so strongly against my position that it shouldn't just be the owners taking a hit when/if they begin playing games with nobody in the stands. Yes, the owners screwed up by not getting clearer language in their original agreement about resuming games without fans. But as DocBauer pointed out, both sides are going to have to be reasonable to get this game back on the field. And comments I have seen from Mr. Boros and others sure don't sound like they want to be reasonable. But that may also be their first salvo at bargaining, which would be understandable.

And someone playing a game for tens of millions of dollars also has enough money. But that isn't the question. Yes, some or even many of the owners were billionaires. But I suspect many, if not all, are taking hits on some or even most of their other investments. Whether they can afford to take a hit isn't the question. It is whether they want to. And I repeat something I don't know to be true but is probably likely, losses of $50,000,000 to $100,000,000 may put several teams into or on the verge of going bankrupt. I know you won't agree, but I am of the opinion that in a time like this you can't expect only the owners to take a big financial hit while the players get 100% compensated for the games played. Even if the players agreed to a 50% cut of their per game salaries, the owners will still lose money this year...a lot of money.

Are you sure the owner's will be fine? What happens to a couple of the weaker teams if they lose $50,000,000? What if they play and the player's get their full salaries and those teams lose $100,000,000? Sure wish there would be someone as wise as you, Doc, sitting at the table when the sides sit down.

Tend to agree with you, although the article I read indicated that there was a reference to economics that the owners are counting on. That's why they are saying the deal they made needs to be changed to account for no fans. I expect if the players don't have some movement, we will not have baseball this year.

Interesting article, thanks.

I read about this a few weeks ago. In that article, there was a mention of some language in the prior deal that alluded to future economics. Agents like Mr. Boros immediately jumped on this issue staking out their side of the argument. At the time that deal was struck, there wasn't a lot of talk about games being played with no fans. With ticket sales being somewhere in the vicinity of half of revenue, it is ridiculous, in my opinion, for players to maintain they should get their full per game salary based on their contracts. If the players refuse to a reasonable compromise, they aren't going to look good to most folks who are living thru these trying times.

Absolutely love how you equate Seth's team of the decade to the HOF.

For much of the decade, Seth, that bullpen was about as good as it gets. Put Santana and Radke at the start of the rotation for a good part of the decade and you have the formula for a team to win a World Series. Kind of a shame they never got it. Lots of rocks have been tossed at the previous FO, but sure looks to me that they put the talent on the field to win it all.

The biggest question is what are these guys going to be doing when the Twins are playing? Seeing there isn't going to be a minor league season, they are going to need to be creative to keep X number of players active and ready when injuries occur. Although not on the 40-man roster, I suspect that Kirilloff and Larnach would get added before players like Celestino and Blankenhorn. That assumes they are playing wherever the replacements are. If there is a three week spring training 2, will FSN televise all of their games? Would sure hope so.

Universal DH, yes. No to the others in the future, however, this year needs to be an exception. I would really like to see MLB expand to 32 teams so there isn't the need to have all the inter league play. Maybe keep it at 6 games so teams can play their cross town rivals. That gets two series a year for the Mets vs. Yankees, Cubs and Sox, Reds and Indians, Dodgers and Angels, etc. Twins would play the Brewers, which is always a good time for lots of fans. Yes, there are some rivalries that really aren't, but for the most part this is fun for the fans.

Great article, especially the part about hoping baseball will be back in a month or so for early summer training. Agree with those above that Atlanta should be in the East and Pittsburgh in the Central. Biggest question to me is what they are going to do with rosters if there is no minor league play. Expect each team will carry their entire 40-man roster with 26 dressing for each game or series or whatever. Don't know how the other 15 will see enough action to keep them sharp and continue their development. Maybe the 15 not on the active roster for each series will play a game or two against the 15 not active players from the team they are playing. Start it at 10 in the morning and it is over hours before the scheduled game starts that evening. One problem is this would require another 15 players traveling to away games and the cost associated with that. But replacements for injuries and poor performance are going to have to come from somewhere.

Going out on a limb here and saying yes, there will be a 2020 season. Will even put a starting date on it. Spring Training-2 will begin the Friday before Memorial Day with opening day Monday, June 22. The Twins will begin their season at home against the Milwaukee Brewers in the revised Central League. The only fans at the game will be players wives and immediate family...who will be regularly tested for COVID-19 as will all the players. The season will be 108 games long, playing 12 games against each of their Central Division rivals with no games against teams from the other divisions/leagues. God willing and COVID-19 cooperating, a limited number of fans will begin seeing games by mid-August. That's my prediction. Doubt I will be correct, but really hoping it is close. The biggest question remaining is whether there will be robo umps for calling balls and strikes?

From what I have read, I get the feeling that there are going to be lots of changes to the current leagues. Wouldn't shock me if AAA ended up being three leagues of 10 teams each, one Eastern, one Western, and one Central. Sure would be nice if the Twins AAA team ended up playing across the river in St. Paul.