The vibes are bad

 I've stated so many times to anyone who will listen that managers barely manager. Player development comes mostly from coaching, and in game strategy is rarely as impactful as we fans like to make it out to be. Managers, though, often reflect the vibes of the team. My biggest criticism of Ron Gardenhire was the way the team played with both hands around their throats in the postseason. Now for the past two seasons with Rocco Baldelli in charge, the vibes were all bad.

The inability to compete in the face of bad news (Joe Ryan's injury) in 2024 was appalling. The fact that year over year the Twins fall flat on their face in clutch situations, such as late in games or with runners in scoring position is inexplicable. There should be rises and falls in those numbers, and they should at least approximate your numbers in other situations. The nail in the coffin was the team performance coming out of the break in 2025. They were in must win series and couldn't beat the Rockies and Nationals. Yuck.

I have no problems with Rocco Baldelli, and I think he will be back on his feet quickly, but it was time to shake up the coaching staff. This can all be true, and it can also be just as true that the rot goes further up than that. I'm not talking Jeremy Zoll or even Derek Falvey, of course. This is an issue with ownership. No secret there, right?

The Star Tribune soft pedaled the Pohlads in a recent article, painting them as baseball diehards who are just as passionate about the team as we are, and wanted to keep the team, but that darn debt made it hard to hang on to the team. Since they got a cash infusion, they were able to keep the team, and look out, here comes some investment! In the context of that article, Baldelli losing his job makes more sense. The real purpose of the article, however, was this paragraph that heretofore unremarkable Pohlad Tom was quoted in.

Tom Pohlad pointed to what he said is an unfavorable economic model for small- and middle-market MLB teams like the Twins. In such markets, revenues “don’t necessarily support” amenities like a first-class ballpark at Target Field or consistently putting a high-performing team together.

Ah yes. That old chestnut. The Twin Cities metro is home to over 4 million people, which makes it larger than San Diego, Cleveland, Milwaukee and Cincinnati (the last one by a wide margin!) and all of those teams are in the playoffs. Going into the offseason the Twins have less money locked into place than the Padres and Brewers, as well as the Rockies, Cardinals, Royals and Pirates. That's some fuzzy math, but it shows who the Twins are punching with, generally. 

The CBA is coming up at the end of next year, and the Pohlads have proven time and again that they are willing to play the victim in negotiations with players. The Pohlads are in worse shape than other organizations with otherwise similar traits in part because of some misfortune on the TV side, but also a fundamental inability to run a baseball team like owners that actually like baseball. Their situation makes them a poster child for the owners' cause at the next bargaining table. 

A lot of hot takes I have seen after Baldelli's dismissal have related to Falvey's record. Sure, some of the teams listed above have greater success with similar progress, but no other team has had a successful team suddenly mandated to cut 30 million dollars in payroll, shortly after their 20 year peak. I'm happy to reevaluate Falvey if this rebuild doesn't go well, but I'm also not going to forget that whatever happens to this woebegone organization, the real villains are the owners. 

The vibes are never going to be great if you have to fight uphill against your own employers.