Owners ask appeals court to clear path for contraction

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Less than two months before spring training is scheduled to start, baseball asked a state appeals court Thursday to clear the way for plans to eliminate two teams before next season.

Lawyers for the Minnesota Twins and major league baseball said the Minnesota Court of Appeals should lift a district judge's order that the team play through the end of the 2002 season to fulfill its lease with the Metrodome.

They urged the three-judge panel not to follow "Homer Hanky jurisprudence."

"No court in the history of the United States has determined that a major league should have a certain number of franchises," baseball attorney Roger Magnuson said.

The Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission, the state attorney general's office and a season ticketholder are fighting to strictly enforce the Twins' Metrodome lease, meaning they would have to play rather than buy out the contract.

Corey Ayling, the attorney for the Twins' landlord, said the lease "is a covenant to operate" and the benefit of the deal for the commission was that the team would play through the end of the contract.

"We didn't force that bargain on the Twins. .... They signed on the dotted line. They consented to this," Ayling said.

Ayling and Alan Gilbert, the state's solicitor general, said the team has a special relationship with the commission -- one that goes beyond money. The agreement, they said, was that the Twins provided the public with entertainment in lieu of paying rent on the Metrodome.

Magnuson said the two sides had a typical commercial relationship under state law and, therefore, a court should order the Twins' owners to pay money damages instead of forcing the team to play games in 2002.

The hearing lasted less than an hour, and judges Edward Toussaint Jr., Robert Schumacher and Roger Klaphake could rule any time.

The Supreme Court last month refused to hear the case out of turn but ordered a speedy appellate court review to leave time for a possible appeal to the high court.

In this case, timing is critical.

Pitchers and catchers are scheduled to report to spring training in mid-February. The longer the injunction stays in place, the harder it will be for baseball to follow through with plans to eliminate teams before next season. A players' union grievance also stands in the way.

Although the targeted teams haven't been officially identified, the Twins and Montreal Expos are thought to top the list because of their low revenue and inability to secure government financing for new ballparks.