'That's a you problem': Colin Cowherd mentions Twins while bashing billionaire owners

Colin Cowherd believes billionaire owners like the Pohlads, who own the Minnesota Twins, are just stuffing their pockets while baseball's elite in New York, Los Angeles and other large markets are willing to spend the money to employ the biggest stars and compete for a championship.

On his show Monday, Cowherd was happy as a clam after Juan Soto signed a 15-year, $765 million contract with the New York Mets. While jokes were flying on social media about small market teams offering Sota $15 million for 765 years, reality was setting in that only a handful of owners are willing to take advantage of Major League Baseball's limitless budget rules, the Twins not among them.

"What about the A's? Nobody in Oakland cared about the A's. What about the small market teams? Pittsburg's got a billionaire owner, they won't spend the money. That's a you problem, Pittsburgh," Cowherd barked.

For Cowherd, superstars playing in small markets like Minnesota is bad for business.

"Every league except the NFL benefits with certain superstars playing in certain markets. The NBA right now has a huge problem. Their best players are in Denver and Milwaukee and Minnesota and Oklahoma City and San Antonio. And it's crushing ratings for the last three years," Cowherd said.

NBA Finals ratings have dropped significantly after an incredible stretch of mega viewership from 2008 to 2019. But to blame it on star players being outside of the largest markets is inaccurate considering the Cleveland Cavaliers went to four straight Finals during the peak of viewership from 2015 to 2018.

Year	NBA Finals	Average viewership per game
2008	Lakers-Boston	14.94 million
2009	Lakers-Orlando	14.35 million
2010	Lakers-Boston	18.14 million
2011	Dallas-Miami	17.34 million
2012	Miami-Oklahoma City	16.86 million
2013	San Antonio-Miami	17.7 million
2014	San Antonio-Miami	15.5 million
2015	Golden State-Cleveland	19.9 million
2016	Golden State-Cleveland	20.2 million
2017	Golden State-Cleveland	20.4 million
2018	Golden State-Cleveland	17.7 million
2019	Toronto-Golden State	15.14 million
2020	Lakers-Miami	7.5 million
2021	Milwaukee-Phoenix	9.91 million
2022	Golden State-Boston	12.4 million
2023	Denver-Miami	11.64 million
2024	Boston-Dallas	11.3 million

Back to baseball. Cowherd isn't blaming Major League Baseball for the lack of parity. He blames cheap owners.

"It's not a network's responsibility to make Oakland's owner more legitimate, or for Tampa's billionaire owner to spend more money. These guys are just stuffing it in their pocket," Cowherd said.

"All these owners are billionaires. If Pittsburgh's doesn't want to spend the money, that is a Pirates issue. NY will spend the money. Dodgers will, Padres will. Atlanta generally does. Houston's willing to," Cowherd continued. "I'm not going to pander to the organization and the billionaires who don't want to spend the money."

Cowherd even made it a point to mention Minnesota never building around Joe Mauer after he signed an eight-year, $184 million contract in 2010.

"Is it better going off to Minnesota and they can't afford anybody around him? We saw that with Joe Mauer. That wasn't good," Cowherd said. "Joey Votto in Cincinnati, they couldn't afford him. Okay we'll pay Votto, we can't pay anybody else. No thanks. I'll take the Mets, the Yankees, the Dodgers, the Braves, Phillies. To me, it's just more interesting."

"It was a great day for baseball. Is it better off going to Minnesota and they can't afford anyone around him?"

— @ColinCowherd on Juan Soto signing 15-year, $765M deal with Mets pic.twitter.com/1GrKrWsj3f
— Herd w/Colin Cowherd (@TheHerd) December 9, 2024