Inside The Twins

Fans react with fury after Pohlads take the Twins off the market

Fans are, understandably, not pleased with Wednesday's announcement from the ownership group.
Will Ragatz|
Jun 26, 2025; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Sparsely seated fans watch the Seattle Mariners play the Minnesota Twins in the seventh inning after a nearly four and a half hour rain delay at Target Field.
Jun 26, 2025; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Sparsely seated fans watch the Seattle Mariners play the Minnesota Twins in the seventh inning after a nearly four and a half hour rain delay at Target Field. | Bruce Kluckhohn-Imagn Images

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Minnesota Twins

The Pohlad family announced on Wednesday morning that they will no longer be selling the Minnesota Twins. This shocking news comes 10 months after the family's initial announcement that they would be exploring a sale of the franchise they've owned since 1984.

Earlier this year, Justin Ishbia was viewed as the "leader in the clubhouse" to buy the Twins — which reportedly caused other potential buyers to back off — but he instead chose to increase his stake in the White Sox. A few months ago, there were reports that the Pohlads had dropped their price from $1.7 billion to $1.5 billion and that interested parties had toured Target Field and were prepared to make an offer. During All-Star week in Atlanta last month, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said he was confident a transaction would take place, and presumably soon.

Now, the possibility of a sale has ended. The Pohlads announced that they'll be adding two "significant limited partnership groups," but they'll remain the controlling owners moving forward.

Fans are not pleased — and that's a massive understatement. Just take a look at the rapidly-growing ratio on the statement the team posted on social media:

That's more than twice as many quote tweets and replies as likes. People aren't happy.

Making this news even more stunning is that it comes two weeks after the Twins held a fire sale prior to the trade deadline, which saw them deal 10 players off of their active roster. Those moves — particularly the Carlos Correa trade with Houston, which was fully a salary dump — shed money off of Minnesota's payroll, which many thought was a way to make buyers more interested in a franchise that reportedly has over $400 million in debts.

Joe Pohlad, in an interview with the Star Tribune's Phil Miller, said the trades "were truly primarily baseball decisions" and were not ordered by ownership.

The Twins will be paying down their debt after finalizing transactions with the two new LP groups, Pohlad said. He would not comment when asked by Miller if payroll will go up next year. Famously, the Pohlads slashed payroll by around $30 million after the team won a playoff series in 2023, their first in 21 years. They're now set to miss the postseason for a second straight year since then.

Pohlad told Miller he's aware fans will be skeptical and perhaps upset.

“And I would say to those fans: It’s my job and this new ownership group’s new job to do everything we can to set this organization up for success, hopefully in the short- and long-term both," he said.

"Our fans are passionate," Pohlad added. "Our fans want to win. We have that in common — we want to win, too. I’d rather have passionate fans than fans who are disengaged."

What he may not realize is that this news strips those passionate fans of their biggest source of remaining hope and optimism for the future, which is that a new ownership group would take over and bring a serious financial commitment towards building a winning team. Now, many of those fans may end up becoming disengaged after having the rug pulled out from under them by an ownership group that hasn't given them any reason to believe things will be different.

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Will Ragatz
WILL RAGATZ

Will Ragatz is a senior writer for Vikings On SI, who also covers the Twins, Timberwolves, Gophers, and other Minnesota teams. He is a credentialed Minnesota Vikings beat reporter, covering the team extensively at practices, games and throughout the NFL draft and free agency period. Ragatz attended Northwestern University, where he studied at the prestigious Medill School of Journalism. During his time as a student, he covered Northwestern Wildcats football and basketball for SB Nation’s Inside NU, eventually serving as co-editor-in-chief in his junior year. In the fall of 2018, Will interned in Sports Illustrated’s newsroom in New York City, where he wrote articles on Major League Baseball, college football, and college basketball for SI.com.

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