Shortly after the Pohlad family announced in October 2024 that it was exploring a sale of the Minnesota Twins, a Pohlad representative contacted Craig Leipold about investing in the Major League Baseball team.

“I’m a big, big believer in the value of sports franchises,” Leipold said in a Monday interview with Twin Cities Business. “The Twins was a business opportunity to get involved in.”

Leipold is the longtime principal owner of the Minnesota Wild, and he previously owned the NHL’s Nashville Predators. So his sports business identity is defined by the hockey world.

He wasn’t making overtures about getting involved in professional baseball, but he reacted to the local circumstances. While Twins fans assumed the Pohlads would exit MLB and sell the team, out of public view the Pohlads were weighing the option of taking on minority owners to bring new capital into the franchise and address a debt load of about $500 million.

“As things moved in one direction, and I had conversations with Tom Pohlad, I was very impressed with the family and the discussion about a minority interest,” Leipold said. “So I just decided to get involved. It’s a business opportunity.”

Leipold, a Wisconsin resident, also has a home in downtown St. Paul and attends a very high percentage of Wild hockey games. He also plans to attend several Twins games during the upcoming season. “I consider myself pretty lucky to be involved in both those franchises.”

Because he spends so much time in the Twin Cities, Leipold said he’s gotten to know the Pohlads. “The one I was closest with would be Jim Pohlad,” he said. After banker Carl Pohlad bought the Twins in 1984, Jim Pohlad was the son who served as the franchise’s top leader.

However, in late 2022, Joe Pohlad was named to succeed his uncle Jim as executive chair of the Minnesota Twins. Just a few weeks ago, the Twins disclosed the identities of their new minority owners. The franchise also announced that Tom Pohlad would replace his brother Joe and that Tom would lead the franchise’s business recovery efforts.

Leipold’s Baseball Business Partner

When the Twins revealed the names of the minority owners on Dec. 17, the team indicated that investments were being made by Leipold as an individual, New York-based Glick Family Investments, and a local group led by George Hicks, co-founder and co-executive chair of the Minneapolis-based Varde investment firm.

Leipold told TCB Monday that a friend of his, Dan Bowen, joined him in making a minority investment in the Twins. They did so as individuals. Leipold didn’t disclose what percentage of the team he and Bowen own, nor did he characterize the size of his Twins investment compared with Bowen.

Bowen is the founder and CEO of Dempsey Ventures, LLC, based in East Grand Rapids, Michigan. In 2006, Bowen established Dempsey Ventures as a family office holding company, which invests in medical device companies and also looks for investment opportunities in real estate, professional sports, and growing companies in other sectors.

Bowen founded Aspen Surgical Products and SunMed (AirLife), which are major medical products companies that he sold. The businesses employ more than 6,000 people worldwide.

Bowen is a minority owner of the Minnesota Wild. “I got to know Dan about four or five years ago,” Leipold said. “He was looking at investing in a hockey team.”

Leipold said that Bowen didn’t want to run a franchise or get involved in issues such as player development. “He just wanted to be an owner,” Leipold said. “He’s absolutely fantastic.”

Since early November, the Minnesota Wild have been one of the most successful teams in the NHL and Bowen has been present for some of the team’s home wins in St. Paul.

“He comes to so many games,” Leipold said. “Grand Rapids is not that far away. He flies over. He brings friends or family, and he usually sits in my suite and watches the games.”

Leipold described Bowen as a self-made man. “He’s just become a very, very close friend,” Leipold said.

Leipold as a ‘Baseball Guy’

Like many boys who grew up in the Midwest, Leipold played football, basketball, and baseball. Hockey wasn’t a team sport in his high school in Neenah, Wisconsin, a small regional center southwest of Green Bay.

Leipold was a catcher on Neenah’s high school baseball team.

“Baseball, as a youngster, was my favorite sport,” Leipold said. “I was a baseball guy. My father was a baseball guy. We would go to baseball games, but it was the Milwaukee Brewers.”

Now that he’s a Twins minority investor, Leipold has a seat on a Twins advisory board. The two investor groups also will each have a seat on the board.

“I’m just going to be in the room listening to begin with,” Leipold said. He isn’t entering the new role with lots of specific advice about how the Twins can improve their relationship with fans and strengthen the player roster. He said the franchise needs to determine where it wants to be in five years and identify what steps it needs to take in each of the next five years.

“I don’t think there’s any secret bullet to make it happen,” he said. “Winning is, of course, the best way to get people in the stadium.” The Twins finished the 2025 season with a record of 70-92. Attendance at home games was 1,768,728, which was the worst attendance since 2000 at the Metrodome and the lowest season attendance at Target Field.

More Ownership Opportunities?

Beyond being the principal owner of the Minnesota Wild and a minority owner of the Minnesota Twins, Craig Leipold is also an owner of two other professional sports franchises.

Leipold is the majority owner and principal investor in Minnesota Sports & Entertainment, a business entity that includes the NHL’s Minnesota Wild and the Iowa Wild of the American Hockey League.

In mid-November, Major League Volleyball announced that a women’s volleyball franchise would be added to the league and would be majority owned and operated by Minnesota Sports & Entertainment. That team is scheduled to begin competition in 2027.

In 2025, Leipold decided to invest in professional men’s baseball and professional women’s volleyball. That’s an expansion since his involvement in hockey, in which he bought the NHL’s Nashville Predators franchise in 1997, sold it, and bought the Minnesota Wild in 2008.

Leipold continues to evaluate options for professional sports investments. In some cases, the investment could be made through Minnesota Sports & Entertainment. In other instances, an investment could be made as an individual.

“We’re looking at other teams,” Leipold said. “There’s more investment available in minor leagues. So that’s what we’re looking at right now.”

He didn’t specify which teams are possible investment options. “We have a group within the Wild that looks at opportunities for us,” Leipold said. “Then we make a determination which is the best way to invest in it.”

In the case of the Minnesota Twins, he said it made the most sense for he and Bowen to invest as individuals. “There is a lot of complexity dealing with Major League Baseball,” Leipold said.