ST. PAUL -- An Alabama businessman wants to buy a major league baseball team, and the Minnesota Twins could be on his list.

"I'm interested in exploring the Twins as an option," Donald V. Watkins from Montgomery, Ala., told the St. Paul Pioneer Press. "I want to play in the game, and if the Twins are the point of entry, that's OK with me."

Watkins, who would be baseball's first black owner, has submitted a purchase offer to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. While he waits for a response, he would like to talk to the Twins.

Watkins, 53, runs a commercial bank in Birmingham, Ala., and a privately held energy company. He is a trustee at Alabama State University and a former special counsel to the Mayor of Birmingham.

He said he would work to build a stadium in the Twin Cities if he owned the Twins. "I used to be a city councilman in Montgomery, so I know what it's like to work in a public-private partnership to grow a sports enterprise," he said.

"I would buy the team without a stadium plan and have enough confidence to sell it to the public. Financing could be a combination of private investment, naming rights and a public bond issue."

Watkins said he made an offer to the Devil Rays "because I thought it was an undervalued asset. The Twins also would fall into my definition of an undervalued asset. In business, you try to buy low, then reinvest to build value. Once you've reinvested, the revenues come -- always," he said.

Forbes magazine valued the Twins at $89 million in 1999. Watkins said that figure was in his financial ballpark. "I have my upper limits, and that's beneath my upper limits," he said.

Whether Watkins and the Twins will get together is not clear. The alliance likely would have to wait for baseball's contraction plan to play out, and for Watkins' bid for the Devil Rays to be sorted out.

Watkins did not immediately return a telephone call from The Associated Press Saturday afternoon.

He said his interest in the Twins was piqued by an inquiring e-mail from a Twins fan, and that if the Twins want to talk, he'll be eager to do the same. A local group led by attorney Michael Ciresi and businessman Vance Opperman has been pursuing a possible offer for the team. Pohlad has said he would sell.

Ciresi could not be reached for comment by The AP on Saturday.

Watkins said he would feel more comfortable if the Twins contacted him, because of his offer to the Devil Rays.

"I'm sure Carl would talk to him," Twins President Jerry Bell said Friday. "But as long as he's negotiating with Tampa Bay, I don't think we'd interfere until that process is completed."