Mauer earns MVP: Can Twins afford to keep him?

MINNEAPOLIS -- Minnesotan to the core, the American League MVP showed again Monday he doesn't do cocky. 

"I'm kind of speechless right now," said a smiling and humble Joe Mauer at a Metrodome news conference. 

The swagger is in his stats and his growing worth as a free agent should the Twins fail to resign Mauer beyond the end of next season.

"They have no choice but to sign him," says Wally Langfellow, publisher of The Minnesota Score magazine.  "It would be a public relations disaster to watch Joe Mauer walk away."

Langfellow says the negotiations may not hinge on the few extra million dollars the Yankees or some other big market team might be able to offer.  "I think it's going to come down to Joe Mauer and his agent looking the Twins in the eye - the Pohlads, staring them in the eye and saying 'you know what, I want to win a World Series and will you guys go out and get the players we need to win a World Series?'"

Mauer didn't put it in quite that context when he responded to a reporter's question Monday about his post-MVP goals.  But the end result was the same.  "A World Series, you know that's where I want to be."

But can the smaller market Twins afford to built a World Series caliber team around a single player who's salary could consume a third of the entire team payroll? 

Eric Brownlee, a member of the University of Minnesota Sport Management faculty, is skeptical.  "Think of A Rod (Alex Rodriguez) in Texas.  That was another situation where you had one great player and they just couldn't build a team around him.  They kept running out of money."

The Yankees, with a payroll three times larger than the Twins, employed nine players last year with salaries larger than the $12.5 million Mauer is due in the last year of his Twins contract.

In the plus column, Mauer's family is in the Twin Cites. He singled out his grandparents on Monday.  "I think they might have missed five games in six years."

"Yeah, I think Joe Mauer wants to be a Minnesota Twin. I think he loves playing here with his family and friends," said Twins General Manager Bill Smith before turning the topic away from Mauer's contract.

As for Mauer, he doesn't do cocky -- nor does he tip his hand.  "We'll let it happen when it needs to happen.  Today we're going to celebrate the year we had and we're definitely going to celebrate."

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