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The Twins announced this morning that they hired unemployed former manager Ron Gardenhire to come back as a special assistant to GM Terry Ryan. No, that does not mean Gardy is going to help make trades and signings. Rather, he'll serve as a roving instructor and evaluator among all Twins minor-league affiliates. It is similar to the position Tom Kelly took after stepping down in 2001 and Paul Molitor had before taking over as manager.
Gardy jumped on a conference call to talk to reporters this afternoon, and I would say you can't make this stuff up, but actually you can:
Gardy: "I just miss the ballpark."
— Mike Berardino (@MikeBerardino) April 18, 2016
Gardy on Padres front office: "I think we were real close. Came down to communication thing. I didn't know where it was leading to."
— Mike Berardino (@MikeBerardino) April 18, 2016
Gardy: "I've been fishing. I've been fishing a lot."
— Mike Berardino (@MikeBerardino) April 18, 2016
Gardy: "Germany called me. That never came to fruit."
— Mike Berardino (@MikeBerardino) April 18, 2016
Gardy: "I've got so much stinking papers now."
— Mike Berardino (@MikeBerardino) April 18, 2016
Gardy: "Have I figured sabermetrics out? Yeah, score one more run than the other guys."
— Mike Berardino (@MikeBerardino) April 18, 2016
The Twins offered this position to Gardenhire right after he was fired, but Gardy was adamant on trying to find another managing job. Gardy explained his change-in-heart during the conference call: "Really it was Carol more than anything else that said, 'You need to go to work.'"
I swear to god I did not make any of this up.