Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
Billionaire Bozos Banish Brave Badmouther
Joe Pohlad, 42, is a nepo baby sports executive, born on third base and entrusted with the Minnesota Twins by virtue of his last name. Joe's grandpa, patriarch Carl, purchased the team in 1984 from notorious racist Calvin Griffith, and despite World Series victories in '87 and '91, the family hasn't been able to shake accusations of being billionaire cheapskates who aren't committed to bankrolling winning on-field products. Those pinch-penny cries reached a fever pitch over the weekend, as the Twins' "atrocious" 2024 collapse concluded at Target Field.
Twins fans Michael Bailey attended Friday's "funeral-like" 7-2 loss to the Baltimore Orioles. Things... didn't go smoothly. Social media video emerged that shows Target Field security officers booting Bailey from the ballpark. His offense? Apparently sneaking in signs that disparaged Twins ownership: "Penny Pinching Pohlads = Twins Mediocrity," "Defund The PO…HLADS." The Twins issued a statement to Fox 9 claiming that Bailey was removed from the ballpark, and slapped with a year-long ban, because he was verbally abusive, used profanity, and, ultimately, was guilty of trespassing; his signs allegedly violated the murky Guest Code of Conduct. (Bailey disputes all of that.) The fiery fan returned to Target Field on Sunday to protest his ouster, telling Fox 9, "It's not a derogatory sign, it's my opinion!" (We've reached to him with multiple interview requests, but he hasn't been as responsive as Glue Girl.) Bailey isn't the only fan who's accusing the Twins of stifling dissent. This season ticket holder's "Go Twins Fire Rocco" T-shirt spurred a scene at the entry gate on Saturday.
Elsewhere in Twins Territory: With commendable feistiness, sportswriting ace Aaron Gleeman pushed Joe Pohlad on why his family, with its theoretically infinite wealth, refuses to invest in their sports franchise. We'll give the final word to Gleeman, from his season-ending column for The Athletic...
This season was, maybe even more than Jim Pohlad’s original uttering of the phrase, a total system failure, presided over by a different front office and manager, but governed by the same billionaire family obsessed with saving a sliver of their unfathomable wealth. They have no one to blame for it but themselves, but unfortunately, it’s fans who are likely to suffer. Again.
As we learned the hard way this season, questionable or downright odious monetary and management decisions made by the business side of a team trickle down to the fan experience, roster and standings. Do the Twins have any real interest in fixing their mistakes and climbing out of this hole they dug? Fans have every reason to assume the worst until shown otherwise.
Digging Deep Into Walz's Contentious China Travels
Why has Gov. Tim Walz spent so much time in China?
If you ask a reactionary conservative, they'll tell you he was being groomed as a sleeper-cell agent of the CCP. If you ask this recent deep-dive story from American Public Media Reports, you'll find the answer is far less nefarious but still quite interesting. In short: Walz has taken around 15 trips—he admits to exaggerating the figure closer to 30—to China, first with teaching nonprofits and high school students and later as a politician. APM Reports couldn't find any signs of Chinese government interference from folks they spoke to for the story, though the reporting does cast doubt on Walz's claims he was in Hong Kong during the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989. (Team Walz team declined to grant an interview, though they did find time for the VP candidate to talk to WeRateDogs... hm.)
The much more interesting question around Walz's China travels is why he's now scrubbing them from his political biography. While running for U.S. Congress is 2006, Walz proudly touted his overseas experience. That's before Republican attacks like this one from Rep. James Comer (R-Kentucky) began bubbling up: “It’s very possible that China would be grooming an up-and-coming, rising star in the political process to try to have a foothold in our government."
Right. So, now, you won't find any mentions of Walz's globe-hopping on the official campaign website.
Some, like longtime China observer Peter Hessler, think running scared from bad-faith GOP conspiracies is unwise.
“It’s a very misguided reaction,” the author/journalist tells APM Reports. "American policy has enormous impact on parts of the world that are developing, that have gone through poverty and isolation, and almost none of our leaders have spent much time in those places... And people don't understand why this is important, but it is important."
Semi-related: I've requested an interview with comedian Jim Gaffigan, who SNL recruited to play Walz; I told his reps I loved the impression (bread-buttering tactic, and also true!), though I don't anticipate our two-bit outlet will hear back. There is some white-hot Midwestern outrage over the mathematically dubious Menards wisecrack:
Update: Gaffigan is allegedly too busy for a 10-minute phone call with Racket.
Loon Statue to Save Capital City?
MinnPost's Bill Lindeke doesn't go that far, but the columnist does assert that the brand-new, 33-foot tall, 25-ton statue from Scottish sculptor Andy Scott is "a hopeful sign for the city."
"Fear not, for I come not to condemn or praise the loon, but to ponder its existence," he writes, assuaging our fears. "Though wary of its ill timing, I welcome the majestic new symbol of change. Despite the awkward provenance, the loon is at least a sign of hope."
In true Lindeke form, the story then dives, loon-like, into the urban history of St. Paul, particularly the hard-luck area around Allianz Field. Among the invoked concepts: housing, tax bases, landlords, strip malls, streetcars, "Blight Rail," and, of course, anti-urban revanchism.
Lindeke worries that the statue, paid for by ex-serpentine UnitedHealth executive/current Minnesota United FC owner Bill McGuire, represents the city "eternally chasing down the benevolence of the 1%." But he ends on an optimistic-ish note, basking in the loon's beauty and saying, hey, it's at least "superior to the post-apocalyptic abandoned pharmacy."
Wanna Sleep in the Purple Rain House?
In either case, that'll at least be an option beginning this October. Timed to the 40th anniversary of Purple Rain, two of Prince's friends/collaborators (Lisa Coleman and Wendy Melvoin) will soon offer the south Minneapolis house featured in the movie through Airbnb. The Longfellow property has been tricked out to the gills with Prince paraphernalia, and local writer Andrea Swensson was initially skeptical in her photo-packed sneak peek for MSP Mag.
"As soon as I stepped into the entryway, my fretting evaporated," she writes. "There was an immediate hit of Prince’s music as we opened the door, there was a handwritten note from Wendy and Lisa, there were velvet slippers, there was a divine lavender smell."
Click here to view the listing, which goes live in just 39 hours, according to the countdown clock embedded by Airbnb.
