Souhan: As Twins prepare to hire new manager, one candidate makes the most sense

The last time the Twins made a managerial change, they fired a Hall of Fame player from St. Paul who might have been one of the smartest players in the history of the game, and hired someone who had never managed at any level.

In moving from Paul Molitor to Rocco Baldelli, the Twins’ front office clearly did not consult their marketing department, but Baldelli won 101 games his first year and division titles his first two seasons.

Keep that transition in mind as the internet rumor mill highlights big-name candidates like Torii Hunter, and internal candidates like Toby Gardenhire. Twins President Derek Falvey might have no interest in making the kind of hire that will excite the fan base on Day 1.

If he were to consult the marketing department, he would hire Hunter or Nelson Cruz. Hunter would bring competitive fire to the dugout, which might be good or destructive in the molding of the young players upon whom the Twins need to rely. Cruz would provide leadership but, like Baldelli, has never managed at any level.

They could make an internal hire, and promote bench coach Jayce Tingler or Gardenhire, the St. Paul Saints manager. Both are well-regarded in the organization and around the game, but both would have to establish that they could solve the Twins’ current problems, which would be difficult because they held key roles as the Twins missed the playoffs four of the past five seasons.

They could bring back an old favorite like Derek Shelton or Wes Johnson, but Shelton lost under similar circumstances in Pittsburgh, and Johnson would be trying to make the transition from managing in college to managing in the big leagues, and I’m not sure the Twins’ situation is the right place and time for that experiment.

So I’m offering a candidate who has Twins ties, experience with several different MLB teams operating with vastly different payroll, is known to be a charismatic leader and was here when the Twins won 101 games in 2019.

Rowson is the Yankees’ hitting coach. He was a bench coach with the Marlins, meaning he has consulted on all manner of in-game decisions. He was an assistant hitting coach with the Tigers when they were developing their current quality batch of young hitters. He has worked with the Yankees, meaning he knows how to deal with outside pressure.

But his résumé isn’t his greatest strength. His greatest strength is his personality.

Managing and coaching often aren’t as much about “what” as “how.” Having massive amounts of information and technical expertise doesn’t matter if you can’t translate all of that knowledge into easily-digestible, comprehendible sentences.

Rowson knows how to build players’ confidence, how to relax them and how to approach at-bats.

Unless the Twins have a wild offseason, they will enter next year with plenty of starting pitching talent, no bullpen and a bunch of questions about their position players.

Add in Walker Jenkins, Emmanuel Rodriguez and Kaelen Culpepper, and the Twins have a large group of talented young players who could make them look a lot like the current Brewers or Tigers; or that could fail and doom the Twins to another five years of rebuilding.

Rowson would be the ideal manager to get the most out of those players.

Someone needs to get through to Wallner, and tell him that trying to hit 500-foot home runs is not as smart as trying to hit line drives, and understanding that a lot of his line drives will land in the bleachers, while allowing him to produce more consistently competitive at-bats.

Someone needs to save Lewis, a superstar in waiting who needs to learn how to limit his slumps.

Someone needs to get the most out of the shortstop of the future, whether that’s Lee, Culpepper or someone else.