After doing a little research, it turns out that the Twins get the same amount of money if they sell 1 Mauer jersey or 1,000,000 Mauer jerseys, All MLB merchandise sales (along with national TV and radio money) go into to a central revenue sharing fund, divided equally among all teams. The only direct impact he could have is local TV revenue, ticket sales and concessions.

Ticket sales in 2010 - 3,223,640   Mauer played 137 games
Ticket sales in 2011 - 3,168,116   Mauer played 82 games
Ticket sales in 2012 - 2,776,354  Mauer played 147 games

If there is a correlation between games he plays in and attendance its not very apparent

I believe IN stadium sales are exempt from the revenue sharing(but I could be ******* up MLB/NFL).    Not sure how much difference that makes but it's probably something.  

Nonetheless, I think the Twins almost HAD to sign Mauer to appease the fan base.  Whether is was a good baseball or business decision could be debated but I got the impression it had to be done.    Perhaps we can find one of the seven Twins fans and ask them.

There is no reliable information about In-park sales, except that 31% of all local revenue is given to MLB. Just by reading that I'm inclined to believe that would include in-park merch. Even so, how much revenue would be generated on in-park Mauer merch?  Not as much as you would think. Just hypothetically (cause I'm bored waiting for my breakfast), how many jerseys do you think are sold in-park per game? 100? 1000? I've been to hundreds of pro games in my lifetime and never once bought a jersey at a game, Sure, I've bought other crap to appease the kids, but never a jersey. And I own probably a dozen or so jerseys (not all baseball). We've all bellied up to the stand that sells team merch, and I honestly can't recall seeing anyone buy a jersey. Ever.

Lets be enormously generous and say 500 Mauer jerseys are sold every game @ $100 a pop (just for easy math). That would generate $4.05m. Now give MLB their 31% and that leaves you with $2.8m, not chump change for sure, but not oil tycoon money either.

Point 2 - The Twins didn't HAVE to sign Mauer to appease the fans. In fact, they have a history of letting their star players go when the price gets too high (Knoblauch, Santana, Hunter etc). Now remember that 2010 was the first year of Target Field - they would have sold tickets regardless (which is supported by the above attendance numbers). Plus they already had his replacement on the roster in Ramos and if he was dealt to the Yanks (as rumored)  I'm sure Montero would've been part of that deal. And that would leave plenty of money to sign a big-time FA (Holliday, Beltre, Lackey were available that year), in fact some wonks had Beltre signing with the Twins that year regardless. Or you wait until the off season and sign a guy like V-Mart or Beltre (also FA in 2011).

Say they signed one of those guys mentioned, I'm guessing the combined merch sales of Ramos/Montero/Free Agent X would've been far greater than Mauer sales, especially in 2011 when sucked dog balls, and possibly generated more ticket sales on top of it.

I know this is all speculation and "what if", but I'm not convinced the Twins had to keep Mauer. Last point, if this guy is truly the hometown hero type, why didn't he give the Twins a hometown discount? He doesn't know the Twins are a small-market team that really can't afford a $23m guy that misses 43 games/yr on average? He's an overpaid, overrated, douchebag that killed his hometown team.

1 - Knoblauch was signed to a very solid deal for the time, but he saw a number of his teammates being cut loose and demanded a trade.
2 - The Twins offered Santana a 4/80 deal which would have made Santana the first $20M per season pitcher in baseball.  Santana turned it down.

3 - At the time, both the Yankees and Red Sox were looking for a catcher.  By comparison to that bidding war, $23M was a small hometown discount.

Douchebag?  really?

You clearly have him confused with Ryan Braun.

Posted by evil_twin on 8/25/2013 11:31:00 AM (view original):
1 - Knoblauch was signed to a very solid deal for the time, but he saw a number of his teammates being cut loose and demanded a trade.
2 - The Twins offered Santana a 4/80 deal which would have made Santana the first $20M per season pitcher in baseball.  Santana turned it down.

3 - At the time, both the Yankees and Red Sox were looking for a catcher.  By comparison to that bidding war, $23M was a small hometown discount.

You clearly missed the point - which is the Twins attendance isn't affected by losing star players.

It's easy to miss the point when you get the facts wrong, that was my point.

How are the facts wrong? So they didn't let Santana go because the price was too high? They didn't lose Hunter because he took more money from the Angels? They didn't deal Knobby because he was a making too much $ on a crappy team (double the next highest guy on the team)?  Dems da facts.

I didn't read this article yet, but off the cuff I'd say that Mauer may very well end up playing a lot of first base next season with Morneau most- likely out.
This is not a "terrible" deal, but the small market- Twins have to do something to show the dedicated fan base and season ticket holders that they are committed to fielding a contender.

You have to throw the attendence figures out for those 3 seasons. We just opened an outdoor stadium after 20 years in the hell hole that was the dome.

Posted by MikeT23 on 8/24/2013 5:52:00 PM (view original):
I believe IN stadium sales are exempt from the revenue sharing(but I could be ******* up MLB/NFL).    Not sure how much difference that makes but it's probably something.  

Nonetheless, I think the Twins almost HAD to sign Mauer to appease the fan base.  Whether is was a good baseball or business decision could be debated but I got the impression it had to be done.    Perhaps we can find one of the seven Twins fans and ask them.

I know in stadium is exempt in NLF I am not sure about MLB.

Back to Mauer though the real issue in MN has been the manager and the pitching coach. How many Twins pitchers have left and goten better afterwards?

Dickey
Loshe
Liriano

Those guys would all be the best starter on the Twins right now. There are a lot more examples of that as well.

Posted by kneeneighbor on 8/25/2013 3:31:00 PM (view original):

Posted by MikeT23 on 8/24/2013 5:52:00 PM (view original):
I believe IN stadium sales are exempt from the revenue sharing(but I could be ******* up MLB/NFL).    Not sure how much difference that makes but it's probably something.  

Nonetheless, I think the Twins almost HAD to sign Mauer to appease the fan base.  Whether is was a good baseball or business decision could be debated but I got the impression it had to be done.    Perhaps we can find one of the seven Twins fans and ask them.

I know in stadium is exempt in NLF I am not sure about MLB.

Back to Mauer though the real issue in MN has been the manager and the pitching coach. How many Twins pitchers have left and goten better afterwards?

Dickey
Loshe
Liriano

Those guys would all be the best starter on the Twins right now. There are a lot more examples of that as well.

To be fair, Liriano was awesome when he was healthy in 2006, then he got hurt and wasn't right again until he found several mph this year, Dickey was a 34 year old journeyman when he threw 65 innings for the Twins, and Lohse had one really good year 6 years after he left the Twins.