2 Major League Baseball franchises could be for sale soon. Could that mean anything for Utah?

In the past week alone, news has surfaced that two Major League Baseball franchises could be for sale soon. Could they also be on the move?

Last Thursday, the owners of the Minnesota Twins — the Joe Pohlad family — publicly announced in a statement that “our family reached a decision this summer to explore selling the Twins.”

Then on Wednesday, The Athletic’s Brittany Ghiroli reported that longtime Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf is “open” to selling the team, according to sources.

These news items come amid a surge in talks over the past several years regarding MLB franchise relocation and expansion.

The Oakland Athletics are already primed to relocate to Las Vegas, while the futures of the Tampa Bay Rays and Arizona Diamondbacks in their current locations have been in various stages of uncertainty over the last year.

As far as expansion is concerned, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred said as recently as last month that the league wants to grow by two teams — from 30 to 32 — although the expansion process likely wouldn’t begin until 2029, and the new teams wouldn’t begin playing until 2031.

In a relocation move, teams would be able to begin playing in their new cities much sooner than that, like how the Utah Hockey Club began moving from Arizona in April and is already playing in Salt Lake City.

Several cities — Salt Lake City being one of them, along with Nashville, Portland, Charlotte and Montreal — have been widely seen as frontrunners to get an MLB team, either through relocation or expansion.

That said, the Pohlads indicated a desire to keep the Twins in Minnesota. The 88-year-old Reinsdorf, however, could be willing to have the White Sox moved in a sale, although Ghiroli reported that the location would likely be Nashville, as Reinsdorf is in talks to sell the team to a group led by former MLB pitcher Dave Stewart, who would then potentially move the team to the Music City.

Stewart was also previously part of the talks regarding the Athletics’ future before the decision was made to relocate them to Las Vegas.

Less than a month ago, Sports Illustrated reported that there’s a chance the Diamondbacks could relocate in the next few years, as there have been some challenges concerning the lease of Chase Field, where the team has played since its beginning in 1998, when MLB last expanded.

Last month, Steve Starks of the Miller Company — which has led a coalition called Big League Utah to try to get a MLB team to the Beehive State — told the Deseret News , “We have done everything we can to this point to be the most prepared market for potential expansion and we’ll continue to do that.”