The Twins never make it easy

Now that a few days have passed since Derek Falvey and Minnesota Twins ownership “mutually agreed” to part ways it seems like a good time to share my thoughts on what happened. When the move was announced on Friday, January 30 it came as a real shock that a parting of the ways like this would take place just two weeks away for the beginning of Spring Training 2026 and just a week after the Minnesota Twins Diamond Awards and TwinsFest took place.

While I was disappointed that this move didn’t take place right after the 2025 season ended, I am still glad that it happened. I see this as the best news that I have seen coming from the Twins camp in a long time. I am no baseball expert but I just don’t think that Falvey was ever qualified for this job and should not have been hired in the first place. I wonder how much the Twins paid him to walk away quietly? It appears that Falvey and Pohlad were not only not on the same wave length, they weren’t even in the same area code.

Derek Falvey was hired by the Minnesota Twins as Executive Vice President and Chief Baseball Officer on October 3, 2016. He officially joined the organization following the conclusion of the 2016 World Series and was later promoted to President of Baseball Operations in November 2019. In 2025 He also took over the business side of the Twins operation from Dave St. Peter who decided to retire.

 

I will give Derek Falvey credit for bringing the Twins Front Office more in line with how baseball is run today but he spent a ton of money to do so and he built himself quite the empire. Some say he went to far.

On the left hand side of this page we have a list of the Twins year end 40-Man Payroll numbers and it seems that those numbers from 2017 through 2025 weren’t that shabby. Surprising? You would think he could have done better than field teams that had an over all record of 690-666 for a .509 win percentage.

His team appeared in the post season four times over nine seasons and just once in the last five years and in that time they won one post season series. In the end it is all about winning the World Series or at least getting there and the Twins have not done that.

Maybe the money spent by the Pohlads was not enough to get to the World Series but the money they did spend should have been enough to make the team competitive. But what does being competitive mean? The dictionary defies competitive as: as good as or better than others of a comparable nature. We all know that MLB is not on an even playing field so where does that leave us?

As I mentioned earlier, I did not think that Derek Falvey was qualified to be President of Baseball Operations much less be assigned the business side also. If the Twins had brought him in as their General Manager, that is a whole different story.

I learned in my 38+ years in the business world that managers are created in different molds. Some managers are best at building departments from scratch or creating new functions and other managers are best at running a department that was built by someone else and is up and running.

I see Falvey as the builder of the team of baseball operations support staff but not as someone who could manage and run Baseball Operations on a day to day basis, I didn’t see that as his strong suit. I don’t question Falvey’s love for the game of baseball, but Falvey not only wanted to manage the big picture, he also wanted to manage the team on the field. You have to stay in your own lane now days, if you want to do it all, you were born about a 100 years too late.

Outside of Carl Pohlad I see Tom Pohlad as the strongest of the Pohlads that have taken a shot at running the Twins. Carl made the final decisions but he had his people in place that he trusted to do the jobs they had and they came to him with options, all he had to do was pick one. We don’t know yet how Tom will run the team but right now he is showing everyone where the power is. We will see if he will turns out to be that hands off owner that Carl was once he hires his guys for the Baseball Operations and Business sides of the business or if he chooses to think he is a baseball expert and runs it with a heavy hands on approach.

I don’t know Tom Pohlad from the guy standing next to me but from what little I have seen of him he seems to know the direction he wants the team to go.That is a good thing, we don’t want a wishy-washy approach at the ownership level. It may not be the road we think is best but then again, we don’t own the team so that old rule of he who holds the gold makes the rules comes into play.

Pohlad says the team will be competitive in 2026, all we can do now is wait and see. It is in the Pohlads interest to field a competitive team if they have aspirations of selling the team. The team has a new manager so there will be a new vibe in the clubhouse. The past two September aberrations are in the rear view mirror. Don’t forget, there is still plenty of time to pick-up and trade for players. We get a chance to to watch Jeremy Zoll in action.

As for me, I will continue to watch this team on TV and maybe catch a game at the ballpark but they are going to have to play decent competitive baseball for me to pay good money for tickets. I don’t think this is as bad a team as people make it out to be, they have a good starting staff, a number of decent hitters that should improve, and some youngsters waiting in the wings that will call Target Field home very soon.

Everybody has their shorts in a knot because of the Twins fire sale at the trade deadline in 2025. But if you think about it, they were out of the running so why not make some deals. Fans would have been just as upset if the Twins had made no moves. It is the relievers being traded that upset everyone. But, I thing the Twins felt that Duran had peaked and he didn’t seem very interested in pitching the way the Twins wanted him to so why not move him at his peak, after all, they still had Jax and Varland to close. But then Toronto calls and says we must have Varland and makes an offer the Twins can’t refuse, so the Twins say OK. We still have Jax to close but then as time is running out and out of no where, Jax says excuse me, but I don’t like whats going on her and want to be traded. Damn, things don’t always go as planned. But do we want a closer that doesn’t want to be here? He still wants to be a starter, so he is gone too. I think things just got out of control at the deadline and Falvey has to take the blame.

Their relief pitching appears to be dismal but we were used to having guys like Varland, Jax, and Duran and not many teams had that kind of bullpen so the Twins will have to play better in the field and with a little luck maybe they can patch together a bullpen that gets us by. Relievers are inconsistent from year to year so who knows.

Expectations for this Twins team are as low as I have seen for a Twins team in a long time. I would expect Derek Shelton in his first day speech to make sure that every player understands that and plays with a chip on his shoulder and shows their fans that they are not the Twins of old. Will they win the Division? No. Will they make the playoffs? Probably not. Can they play .500 ball? I think they can, but they need good health to be on their side for a change.

Enjoy the game of baseball in 2026 because you might now get that opportunity in 2027 due to a possible lockout and an anticipated battle over salary caps and floors. This is another reason for the Twins to field a good team in 20026, if fans quit watching this team this year and there is no MLB in 2027, Minnesota’s baseball fans may well forget the Minnesota Twins even exist.

To the Pohlad Family: Like any other business, we need each other for the business to be successful.

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