Reusse: Vavra's experience helps him as Molitor's right-hand man

FORT MYERS, FLA. – The 36 pitchers and catchers among the Twins' participants in spring training had a first formal workout on Feb. 23. They were joined officially by the 25 position players on Feb. 28.

The Twins will play the last of 33 exhibitions (counting the Gophers) on April 4, then head to the airport for the flight to Detroit and the start of the season.

Those are 41 days from the official start of Florida preparation to departure, and there was one scheduled day off: last Monday, March 16.

The players, manager, coaches, field support staff and office employees refer to it as the "Day Off,'' as if it was a national holiday. Everybody involved with the big-league club stays away from the ballpark on the Day Off.

Almost.

I was walking to the minor league fields early Monday afternoon, and Joe Vavra was walking in the opposite direction. He was in his uniform pants and a T-shirt, and aimed toward the major league clubhouse.

What are you doing here, Joe?

Tanner Vavra, 25, is an infielder entering his third season with the Twins organization. He was drafted in the 30th round in 2013 is targeted for high-A Fort Myers this season. Treysen Vavra, 23, is a first baseman drafted in the 36th round last summer and figures to play for low-A Cedar Rapids.

"Tanner and Trey are good ballplayers," Vavra said. "The Twins didn't draft them because I work here. They wouldn't do that."

There was considerable sentiment that Vavra's time with the Twins — at least his nine-season run on the big-league staff — was over when manager Ron Gardenhire was fired on Sept. 29.

Paul Molitor was named manager on Nov. 3. Tom Brunansky's return as hitting coach was announced three days later.

The Twins added four more coaches over the next three weeks: Gene Glynn, Eddie Guardado, Rudy Hernandez and Neil Allen. This left spots for bench and first-base coaches.

That failed to take into account Molitor, 58, has been making strategic decisions in his own head for four decades, including during the 2,700 big-league games in which he played.

It became public on Nov. 25 that Joe Vavra would be Molitor's bench coach. The seven-coach staff was completed a week later with Butch Davis, a former big-league outfielder.

The public reaction to Vavra's hiring was highly critical. I joined in taking shots, based on the same antiquated view as most civilians on what a bench coach should be:

An old guy with a comically round face sitting at Joe Torre's shoulder in the Yankees dugout on a cold October night.

All of our bashing was wrong. An old-timer nodding his approval to use the wheel play to defend a bunt is not a big-league bench coach — not in 2015.

"I'm there with any information Paul needs. I'm there for a reminder when a game starts moving fast. There can be a lot going on at once late in a close game and I'm there to make sure Paul takes everything into account.

"We had a game like that the other day — when five things were happening at once. I said to Paul, 'We need eight more games like this before we leave here. New staff. We need the wheels turning.' "

Vavra is much more than Molitor's shadow in the dugout in Florida. This is his third year as the man who makes the schedule in spring training — who has made sure all 61 players (now 43, after early cuts) are at the fields they are supposed to be, and on time.

It's the task that Rick Stelmaszek performed for 26 years for Tom Kelly and Gardenhire.

"Joe's here way early, stays late and then he gets home at night and does more work on the computer," Molitor said. "And once we got out on the fields, every time I turned around, he was working with one of the seven catchers we had here. He's good at that, too.