The estimated value of the Twins franchise has increased by more than 100 percent in five years.
Forbes.com released its annual guesstimated valuations of major league baseball teams recently and valued the Twins at $490 million. The estimated value in 2006 was $216 million. That calculates to a 126.8 percent increase.
It was five years ago when the state legislature approved funding by Hennepin County and the Twins to build Target Field. The downtown stadium, recognized nationally among the best baseball venues in the country, opened last year to record franchise attendance for a single season.
It has been a change in stadiums, not winning, that jump-started the franchise’s value. The club won a division championship in 2006 while playing in the antiquated Metrodome. Three of the four previous seasons the Twins had been Central Division champions so winning was nothing new in 2006 when Forbes ranked the franchise the 29th most valuable among 30 teams in major league baseball.
Forbes assigned the Twins a No. 12 valuation this year after a season of outdoor baseball in Target Field, a ballpark that emphasizes fan friendly features. That valuation has the Twins ahead of such historic franchises as the Braves, Orioles, Pirates and Tigers.
The Twins’ operating income (pre-tax, pre-interest profit) has increased from $7 million in 2006 to $26.5 million, according to Forbes. That income and the appreciation in franchise value are big payoffs for the Twins’ ownership that reportedly invested $195 million in the $545 million ballpark.
In the years ahead the Twins will need to continue winning if the ballpark in going to be full and revenues are to increase. The perennially losing Pirates, operating in a ballpark similar to Target Field, ranked No. 30 in value on the 2011 Forbes list.