The Minnesota Twins weren't subtle about their intentions at the MLB trade deadline. They traded nearly half of their big league roster, conducting the fire sale of all fire sales as they looked to clear salary, add prospects and look toward the future. Regardless of what the front office tries to tell fans about this simply being a reset, or that they're confident in the players currently on the roster, or whatever other corporate speak they try to spin this as, the Twins essentially tore it all down, and the Carlos Correa trade was the biggest indicator that there's no desire to really compete in the near future.
Correa was traded back to the Astros, where he started his MLB career, for a 26 year-old prospect who has never pitched above High-A ball. That's as clear a salary dump as you'll ever see — and if you needed any more assurance of that, Bob Nightengale of USA Today reported that Houston offered Christian Walker in a potential Correa deal but the Twins turned it down.
Now, it's not surprising that a team well out of contention this year wouldn't want to add Walker's $40 million contract that's spread over the next two years. The Astros first baseman is having a brutal year, posting his worst OPS since 2018. He's failed to get any momentum in 2025 after three really good years in Arizona, so he's far from the intriguing trade chip that he would have been a few years ago.
Still — if the Twins had any interest in competing next season, they would have at least asked for a MLB player in return for Correa, and it sounds like the Astros were at least willing to negotiate a deal like that. Instead, the Twins said "Just take him, damn," and gave Correa back to the AL West leading Astros for... almost free.
Twins fans feel betrayed and it's hard to blame them
Being a Minnesota sports fan isn't too bad overall right now; Anthony Edwards, Justin Jefferson and Napheesa Collier are superstars of their respective sports and all of their teams are on a positive trajectory in the backhalf of the 2020s. The Twins apparently decided that three good teams in the state is plenty and pushed the abort mission button on the future while they were at it.
The Twins trading a bunch of players at the deadline wasn't a surprise — in fact, selling this year was smart. Aside from one scorching hot stretch, this team simply isn't very good. But when you zoom out and look at what the Twins got (and didn't get) back in these trades, it's hard to convince yourself this team cares about winning in the near or intermediate future, either.