MPR's Andrew Haeg reports that Minnesotans continue to ponder life without the Minnesota Twins. The team is a prime candidate for elimination if Major League Baseball carries through its intended plan to contract the league. If the Twins are shut down, businesses will lose customers….and local community organizations will lose an important benefactor.
ANDREW HAEG: This is the neonatal intensive care unit at the Hennepin County Medical Center in Minneapolis. The staff here helped save and nurture premature babies. Dr. Rich Lussky is in charge of the unit. Today, he has 22 babies and one that might not make it.
RICH LUSSKY: These are these critically ill babies that just deteriorate so quickly in an intensive care unit. And last night, he was doing fine. And literally hour by hour, he's deteriorating.
ANDREW HAEG: Saving newborns is Dr. Lussky's number one concern. But today, he's also thinking about saving the Twins. The two missions aren't as disconnected as you might think.
The Twins have, over the years, helped pay for breastfeeding education programs for impoverished mothers. They've paid for special pillows and stools that help mothers breastfeed their newborns. And they routinely donate tickets to mothers who need a break from the stress of watching their babies struggle to live.
RICH LUSSKY: I probably have had 100 people come up to me in the hospital in the last two days and said, what's going to happen if the Twins leave? All of the support we're going to lose.
ANDREW HAEG: If the Twins leave, Dr. Lussky says, his unit will quickly feel the effects.
RICH LUSSKY: Physicians and nurses will be here. And our ability to keep babies alive will still be here. But the ability to improve their development and to continue with successful breastfeeding outcomes and provide support materials in the family resource room will be significantly impacted. And I would say, it would be devastating.
ANDREW HAEG: The Twins have developed close ties to the community over the past 40 years. Twins officials say, the team provides several hundred thousand dollars to about 1,000 community organizations.
And then there are the organizations that the athletes themselves choose to help. Kirby Puckett has raised over $3 million for Children's Heart Link. Former first baseman Kent Hrbek raised $100,000 this year for people with Lou Gehrig's disease. And just recently, Twins pitcher Brad Radke and his wife donated $30,000 to Dr. Lussky's neonatal intensive care unit.
Peter Martin is manager of community affairs for the Twins. He says, the death of the Twins will serve a harsh blow to the organizations that depend on the team.
PETER MARTIN: Are those guys bigger and more resilient than this ball club? Maybe to a certain extent. But definitely, those things are going to be impacted no matter what.
ANDREW HAEG: The Twins are also a major source of revenues for businesses throughout the Twin Cities. The greater Minneapolis convention and Visitors Association recently surveyed local businesses about the money they make from people who attend Twins games.
They found that out-of-town visitors to Twins games spent some $103 million this year on entertainment and lodging outside the Metrodome. They estimate that Twins fans from in and around the Twin Cities may have spent as much as three times that number or $300 million. Scott Anderly owns Hubert's Bar, kitty-corner from the Metrodome.
SCOTT ANDERLY: In a given year, the Twins volume is anywhere between 15% and 20% of our total business.
ANDREW HAEG: Anderly says, he'll have to cut staff and business hours if the Twins go away. He's concerned about his business, but he wouldn't mind seeing the Twins move to another Twin Cities location if it meant they could stay.
SCOTT ANDERLY: I'll survive. Hubert's will survive. It's not going to mean that we're closing our doors by any means. But I would hate to see the Twins leave. And I've always said, I just assume they build a new stadium, even if it's three miles or five miles from me, I don't care. I would prefer to see baseball stay in this market.
ANDREW HAEG: Back at the Twins Metrodome offices, team officials are considering their prospects.
DAVID SAINT PETER: The best we can do is hold out hope that this is not a done deal and that there's a chance that we're going to play baseball in Minnesota in 2002.
ANDREW HAEG: Twins spokesman David Saint Peter.
DAVID SAINT PETER: There's all kinds of people and companies and organizations all across the upper Midwest that will be impacted by the potential loss of Major League Baseball in this market.
ANDREW HAEG: Outside the dome, two students producing a short film for a school project paused to reflect on the Twins potential fate. Seth Johnson is 21 years old.
SETH JOHNSON: It's basically the owner's decision. It's not the people who watch the games, you know? It's not the thousands and thousands of fans who watch the game who have the vote on the say of whether the Twins stay or not. It's the people who own it and the people who run the organization.
ANDREW HAEG: Baseball commissioner Bud Selig has said, baseball hopes to make a final decision on contraction before spring training next year. I'm Andrew Haeg, Minnesota Public Radio.
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