I've been inspired.
Eric in Madison is one of Twinkie Town's original members, and I'm fairly certain he was onboard for the switch from Twins Territory via Twins Geek over to where we currently chill and chat about Twins baseball. Eric, you signed up on November 19, 2005. That was four years ago yesterday. Well done, sir.
At any rate, I want to get this out of the way: I usually don't tackle things like this. Why? Honestly, part of me doesn't care. Part of me is more concerned about evaluation of current or prospective players (and prospects) and how they fit into the future of the club. But part of me, a small part, agrees that it would be extraordinarily helpful in our evaluation of the organization's use of funds if we knew how much they had to spend. Generally.
This gets a little tricky in that next spring, the Twins more into Target Field. Revenues will jump, dramatically, because...well, because it will actually be the home of the Minnesota Twins. For those of you who weren't hip (how about that for dated slang that outdates me), the revenues the Twins received through the Metrodome were stunted because it was a building that belonged to the Minnesota Vikings. The Vikes grabbed a major percentage of revenues from things like parking and beer and hot dogs. And so now that the Twins have their own park, they'll start to reap the benefit of additional revenue, because they won't have to give up a percentage of it to a sports team that plays a completely different game.
Eric's conversation in the FanPosts is intriquing, and ultimately it asked one question: how much can we expect the Twins to take in revenue in 2010?
I can't answer that question, because I have no idea how to find out how much more they'll be able to pull in now that revenues belong exclusively to them. But what I can do, courtesy of Forbes, is tell you what revenues the Twins have pulled in via the Metrodome over the last ten years.
We'll compare those revenues with the payrolls of the following season, because that's how the Twins have allegedly awarded money towards payroll. We can't use revenues for the the same year as the payroll, because that doesn't make any sense.
| Year | Revenue | Year | Opening Day Payroll | Payroll % of Revenue |
| 2000 | $48,000,000 | 2001 | $24,100,000 | 50.2 |
| 2001 | $58,000,000 | 2002 | $40,200,000 | 83.8 |
| 2002 | $75,000,000 | 2003 | $55,500,000 | 74.0 |
| 2003 | $87,000,000 | 2004 | $53,600,000 | 61.6 |
| 2004 | $99,000,000 | 2005 | $56,200,000 | 56.8 |
| 2005 | $102,000,000 | 2006 | $63,400,000 | 62.2 |
| 2006 | $114,000,000 | 2007 | $71,400,000 | 62.6 |
| 2007 | $131,000,000 | 2008 | $62,200,000 | 47.5 |
| 2008 | $149,000,000 | 2009 | $65,300,000 | 43.8 |
| 2009 | $158,000,000 | 2010 | $83,000,000 | 52.5 |
| Total | $1,021,000,000 | -- | $534,900,000 | 52.4 |
Now, these numbers are based off either A) the revenue number provided by Forbes or B) the payroll numbers provided by relevant links or Cots Contracts figures.
The problem is that I can't guarantee what those revenue numbers include, but the Forbes article itself says the Twins spent around 63% of revenue on players over the last five seasons compared to 57% league average. Obviously the numbers somewhere don't jive.
Minnesota has averaged a $14 million bump in revenue over the last four seasons, but ignore that for now. If we're taking this season's revenues to calculate next year's payroll, then $83 million isn't a bad total. No doubt, however, the Twins are correctly anticipating increased revenues thanks to Target Field.
If we want accurate figures there's a lot of research to do, and there's still no guarantee how close or accurate we could be in regards to predicting next year's available payroll. Knowing what I know now, and keep in mind that is more than subject to whatever facts are laid out in the comments section below, I have to believe the Twins are probably right around the mark in terms of payroll VS revenues. At least, until someone can prove otherwise.