Settlement Appears to Save Twins

The Minnesota Twins will be saved--in 2003, at least--if the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission receives and approves a written agreement with the Twins and Major League Baseball regarding a proposed settlement of the commission’s lawsuit against the Twins and baseball.

The commission had been expected to vote on the agreement Wednesday, according to sources, but delayed that decision until it receives a copy in writing.

Baseball sources said they viewed that as a formality, and Commissioner Bud Selig said he was “hopeful” this would remove one of several significant hurdles in keeping the Twins in Minnesota beyond next year.

Should that happen, and the Twins survive, it would seem to remove the possibility of any elimination of teams in 2003.

Baseball had ticketed the Twins and Montreal Expos for elimination, and Selig reiterated on Wednesday that the industry can’t fold one team at a time because it would create scheduling difficulties.

However, Selig added, if the obstacles to keeping the Twins in Minnesota are removed, the next step on the contraction front would be the decision by arbitrator Shyam Das on the union grievance charging that management cannot unilaterally contract without the players’ approval.

That decision is expected in late July or early August, and a confident Selig said “once that ruling is made, we plan to proceed with contraction. We have other candidates.”

Although Selig never named the Twins and Expos as the victims when he revealed the contraction scenario in November, the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission filed suit in Hennepin County Court, and Judge Harry Crump issued a temporary injunction that was upheld on appeal and forced the Twins to honor the final year of their Metrodome lease, as they are now doing.

The suit, which contends that baseball illegally interfered with the commission’s ability to negotiate a long-term lease with the team, remained on the court docket as a possible insurance policy if attempts to keep the team in Minnesota through legislative support for a new stadium failed. Under the proposed agreement, the commission will drop the suit if the team stays in 2003 but would have the right to reintroduce it if baseball tried to eliminate or move the team in 2004.

The behind-the-scenes efforts by Selig and other baseball officials to resolve the suit out of court, with Crump serving as mediator, seem a contradiction to the initial attempt to eliminate the Twins, but skeptics believed from the start that contraction, as applied to the Twins, was designed only as leverage to influence the Minnesota legislature to pass a stadium financing bill that would enable Carl Pohlad, the Twins’ owner and Selig ally, to find a local buyer.

The legislature recently passed a $330-million funding package for a roof-ready ballpark, but among the provisions that could prove insurmountable, it still requires a voter referendum and a $120-million down payment by the Twins.

There is also no buyer on the horizon, but as a baseball source said, “no one is going to step forward while there are unresolved legal issues. We’re hopeful that the suit has been cleared up and we can move on to resolving the stadium situation.”