Continuing their “full-court press on a dwindling season-ticket base, the Twins fired off another letter to fans” yesterday following the official announcement of Derek Falvey as their first-ever Chief Baseball Officer, according to Mike Berardino of the ST. PAUL PIONEER PRESS. The letter, signed by Twins Owner Jim Pohlad and President Dave St. Peter, “begins with another mention of the ‘profound disappointment’” in a Twins-record 103-loss season in ‘16. The letter reads, “We share your frustration with the on-field results, but remain steadfast in our belief that better days are indeed ahead.” Falvey is “credited in the letter with having ‘positively impacted all aspects’ of baseball operations” for the Indians, where he “spent his entire nine-year career in professional baseball." Pohlad and St. Peter in the letter write Falvey had a hand in the "development of an organization-wide pitching philosophy.” Berardino notes average paid attendance at Target Field “sagged to 24,246 this season as the Twins failed to reach 2 million in total home attendance for the first time in a dozen years.” The Twins’ season-ticket base has “plummeted from 25,000 at the opening of Target Field in 2010 to 14,000 this season and a team-projected figure as low as 9,000” in ’17 (ST. PAUL PIONEER PRESS, 10/4).
CHANGE IN DIRECTION: In Minneapolis, LaVelle Neal III notes Falvey will “join the club at the conclusion of the Indians’ playoff run and will become the sixth person to head the Twins’ baseball department.” Falvey replaces Exec VP & GM Terry Ryan. While the title is different from Ryan's, Falvey “undoubtedly will be the No. 1. baseball executive.” He is “expected to hire someone to work under him,” possibly as the GM. Rob Antony will “remain the interim GM until Falvey begins his tenure with the Twins.” Falvey’s arrival is a "quantum shift for an organization that has had a ‘next man up’ mentality when it has come to appointing the head of their baseball department.” The “last time they hired from outside” was Andy MacPhail in ‘86, and the Twins won the World Series in ‘87 and ’91 (Minneapolis STAR TRIBUNE, 10/4). CBSSPORTS.com’s Mike Axisa wrote Falvey is “highly regarded within baseball and has a strong background in analytics, which is an area the Twins have been sorely lacking in recent years.” The Twins are “behind the times,” and building a "modern analytics department figures to be one of Falvey's immediate priorities” (CBSSPORTS.com, 10/3).
