Twins promote Derek Falvey, Jeremy Zoll as president Dave St. Peter prepares to step aside

Thirty-four years after he bet on himself, Dave St.

Peter is at long last stepping down.

The Minnesota Twins club president since 2002 informed employees Tuesday morning that hes transitioning into an advisory role early next year, a decision that creates a personnel carousel in which president of baseball operations Derek Falvey is elevated to St.

Peters role and Jeremy Zoll takes over as the teams general manager.

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Peter originally joined the Twins as a game-day intern in 1990 and several months later reluctantly accepted a full-time retail job managing the clubs pro shop in Richfield, Minn.

Named president in November 2002, St.

Peter played a key role in the approval, design, creation and opening of Target Field.

The ballparks debut in 2010 was the centerpiece of a transformation that saw the Twins go from nearly contracted also-rans into a club that won the American League Central nine times and made 10 postseason appearances.

More than 2 1/2 years after he began succession planning with ownership, St.

Peter said a combination of factors needing to better prioritize his time, the teams impending sale , and Falveys development made the timing appropriate.

Though St.

Peter will officially hand over duties in early 2025, he intends to maintain a presence at Target Field as an advisor to Falvey.

This has been my life, St.

Peter said.

This has been my journey.

Ive given everything I have to this organization and have been proud to do it.

Its been a privilege.

But we felt like now was the right time for a number of reasons.

Clearly, I think the opportunity to work with the family and see through the sale exploration process is important.

And theres a role for me to play on that.

Secondly, I feel truly convinced that Derek Falvey is the right successor and want to support him in every way and set him up for success, hopefully, over the long haul.

...

I feel really blessed to have had the run Ive had here in this chair, and Im very much at peace with this decision.

This has been a whirlwind offseason for the Twins, who after failing to make the playoffs mutually parted ways with GM Thad Levine, fired multiple coaches and announced the Pohlad family was exploring selling the club after 40 years and three generations of ownership.

The team also announced that Major League Baseball would assume control of its television and streaming broadcasts .

Advertisement Though the succession plan was already in place, St.

Peter said that ownerships Oct.

10 sale announcement sped up the timeline to place Falvey into a hybrid role in which hell oversee the teams baseball and business operations.

Both Falvey and St.

Peter suggested several department heads in business and baseball operations would take on expanded roles to reduce the number of tasks Falvey handles.

But it was the development of Falvey, whom St.

Peter hired in September 2016, that made the decision to step away easier.

Though his main task was overhauling and modernizing the clubs baseball operations, Falvey also worked closely with St.

Peter in recent years on the business side.

With St.

Peters permission, Falvey attended meetings about the teams broadcast situation and other areas.

St.

Peter teared up Monday afternoon as Falvey described a close relationship that makes him confident he can assume a role few of his major-league counterparts have held.

This only works because this is something that Dave wants, Falvey said.

I feel incredibly honored to take on a role.

Not Daves role exactly, because no one can be Daves role exactly.

No one can be Dave St.

Peter; Im not even going to try.

But I will take on a different role with different leaders underneath, with different structure, that ultimately will hopefully lead this team into the next phase.

Falvey sees Zoll, who joined the Twins in October 2017 to run the farm system, as equally capable of handling his new role.

Zoll spent two seasons as the teams farm director before he and Daniel Adler were promoted to assistant GM in November 2019.

One of Zolls main tasks when operating the farm system was handling daily interactions with player agents about any issues that arose.

His later duties included identifying and acquiring minor-league free agents.

Advertisement Following his promotion to assistant GM, Zoll joined a sizable decision-making group that makes player recommendations to Falvey.

He did the bulk of negotiating on the Sonny Gray and Jorge Polanco trades in 2022 and 2024, respectively, and maintains a constant presence in the Twins clubhouse, working closely with manager Rocco Baldelli.

Jeremy is more than ready to lead aspects of our baseball operation, Falvey said.

His role, his experiences, what hes done, they speak for themselves.

Hes been a tremendous leader in our player development space, around our major-league team.

Rocco, the staff, everyone, JZ is the person they go to.

...

Hes naturally already connected to a lot of areas of oversight and has been doing that job of oversight in a lot of those spaces.

This (is the) next step in his journey.

Zoll appreciates how the front office operates together under Falveys stewardship.

Because of his familiarity with the group, he feels comfortable assuming the title formerly held by Levine, who was the clubs GM from November 2016 until last month.

The way that it has always functioned since Ive been here has felt like a team approach, Zoll said.

Our goal is to have that continue with partnerships between Derek and myself and with all the leaders across the group.

There will be ebbs and flows of roles and responsibilities for all of us, but I think thats probably always happened from year to year, maybe without some of those formal title changes for various people along the way.

Zolls day-to-day duties will increase, but the specifics are still being worked out as Falvey promises hes not going anywhere on the baseball decision-making front.

The Twins also plan to fill the assistant GM role vacated by Zoll, and others in the department will be elevated to help fill some of the gaps created by Falveys ascension.

After meeting Falvey in 2016, St.

Peter knew the Twins were hiring someone special.

When we concluded the interview process and made the decision to offer Derek the job, there was a subgroup of us that looked at each other and said, This guy might be my successor, St.

Peter said.

Advertisement Falveys hire is one of many successes that occurred during St.

Peters tenure.

When St.

Peter originally was named president, the Twins had about 65 to 70 employees, a number thats increased to 400.

Following years of threats to move out of Minneapolis, and MLB s contraction threat, St.

Peter played a critical role in working with the Minnesota Legislature to get construction of Target Field approved in November 2006.

He also helped design and open the teams minor-league player dormitory in Fort Myers, Fla., and its facility in the Dominican Republic.

Early in St.

Peters tenure, a franchise that struggled to barely draw 1 million fans in 2000 fared well at the gates.

With a talented young core featuring Torii Hunter, Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau and Johan Santana, the Twins drew 2 million to 2.4 million fans to the Metrodome each season from 2005-09.

Though the Twins have recently struggled at the gate, the club drew a franchise-record 3.2 million fans in 2010, the first season at Target Field.

St.

Peter may be proudest of how the team operated during the COVID-19-impacted 2020 season as he and the Pohlad family made the decision to keep all Twins employees on the payroll and pay minor-league players at a time when other organizations did not.

It made me a better leader, St.

Peter said.

When you combine COVID with what happened in our community around George Floyd and racial justice, it was a really chaotic, uneven time.

So maybe it sparked for me what I wanted to do longer-term.

St.

Peter said his toughest decision was firing Terry Ryan as the head of baseball operations in August 2016.

He also described the teams postseason failures as his biggest disappointment.

Dealing with the teams tenuous broadcast situation the past two years, which included a three-month blackout for the majority of viewers in Twins Territory last summer, didnt play a role in his decision, St.

Peter said.

He remains interested in the teams developing broadcast plans and will advise in that area as the Twins become one of six teams under MLBs broadcast umbrella in the 2025 season.

Advertisement Overall, St.

Peter thinks hes leaving the Twins in a good place as they prepare to be sold.

This is a gem of a franchise and Im very bullish on the future of baseball in the Twin Cities, he said.

None of this might have been possible if St.

Peter didnt take a risk 34 years ago.

He began as a game-day intern in 1990, working at the Metrodome.

Several months after he started, the Twins offered him a full-time job as the general manager at the Twins Pro Shop in Richfield.

Though St.

Peter wasnt sure he wanted the position because of the retail element, he accepted.

One of his favorite memories was attending Game 7 of the 1991 World Series and realizing in the euphoric aftermath that he needed to be back at the shop before dawn to restock Twins merchandise.

After 18 months running the store, St.

Peter rejoined the front office in a business communications role and began to work his way up in the organization.

The beauty in that story is one of opportunity, St.

Peter said.

I didnt know anybody.

People saw something in me, thankfully.

...

I told myself early on, Im coming out of Bismarck in North Dakota.

I think I have an insecurity complex around that and I said, Nobody was going to outwork me.

Over time, I think its served me well.

...

Its the right time.

Id rather go out a year or two too early than a year or two too late.

(Top photo of Derek Falvey: Matt York / Associated Press).

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