The Minnesota Twins will stay under the control of the Pohlad family, which had explored a potential sale of the MLB team over the past year.
Following conversations with numerous potential bidders, including some who wanted to buy control from the family, the Pohlads have agreed in principle to instead to take on minority investment from two different groups, according to a statement shared with Sportico. The transactions are awaiting approval from MLB.
The new LP groups, composed of individuals the team did not identify, include a handful of locals from the Twin Cities area and an East Coast family not currently invested in major sports, according to multiple people familiar with the details. They’ll form the backbone of a new corporate board to assist the Pohlads on both strategy and decision-making. The deal does not include a future path to control for either group, the sources said.
The Twins are worth $1.7 billion, according to Sportico’s MLB valuations. These LP deals carry a higher implied valuation, according to one of the sources, who was granted anonymity because the details are private. The funds from the raise will go toward paying down team debt, the sources said, which is approximately $400 million.
“After a detailed and robust process, our family will remain the principal owner of the Minnesota Twins,” Joe Pohlad, the team’s executive chair, said in the statement. “To strengthen the club in a rapidly evolving sports landscape— one that demands strong partnerships, fresh ideas, and long-term vision—we are in the process of adding two significant limited partnership groups, each of whom will bring a wealth of experience and share our family values.”
The Pohlads have owned the Twins since Carl Pohlad bought the MLB team in 1984 for $44 million. He was baseball’s richest owner upon his death in 2009. His three children—Jim, Bob and Bill—inherited the club with Jim initially serving as control owner. Joe, who is Bob’s son, took over in 2022. The team hired Allen & Co. to explore sale options last year.
The family is the fourth longest-tenured owners in baseball, trailing the ownership groups for the New York Yankees (1973), Chicago White Sox (1981) and Philadelphia Phillies (1981). Longtime White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf recently reached an agreement to have billionaire Justin Ishbia invest further in the team, with a path to control at some point in the near future. Ishbia also initially expressed interest in the Twins, Sportico previously reported.
The Twins won the World Series twice in the first decade of the Pohlad ownership reign but have struggled more recently, winning one playoff series in the past 23 years. The team’s payroll has ranked in the bottom half of MLB for more than a decade, and the Twins currently sit in fourth place in the AL Central with little chance of reaching the postseason. At the trade deadline two weeks ago, the Pohlads shredded the roster by trading away nearly a dozen players, including club record free-agent signing Carlos Correa, who they sent to the Houston Astros.
There have been just five MLB teams to change hands in the last decade—the Orioles (2024), the Mets (2020), the Royals (2020), the Marlins (2017) and the Mariners (2016). The Twins are at least the third team in the last few years to run a formal process that included a potential control stake before ultimately deciding to do something smaller. Both the Los Angeles Angels and Washington Nationals hired banks to explore their options in the past few years, and both ownership groups ultimately decided to keep their teams.
Part of the slowdown in control sales may be attributed in part to the uncertainty around local media rights, a critical component of many teams’ business. The Twins are among those teams that have been affected—the struggling Diamond Sports Group carried the team’s games in 2024 at a reduced rate, and MLB took over the production and distribution of Minnesota games starting this season. The league did the same with several other clubs.
Hogan Lovells served as legal advisor to the Pohlads during the sale process.