Wes Johnson reveals how MLB experience helped him eventually become a head coach

New Georgia head coach Wes Johnson has a unique path to coaching a Power Five college baseball program. He spent a decade at the high school level before taking the leap to being an assistant coach at the college level.

Then in November 2018, the Minnesota Twins hired him as their pitching coach. He stayed with the team until midway through last season when he took the pitching coach job at LSU.

While he was with the Twins for just three-and-a-half seasons, Johnson said it was a key part to his growth. During his introductory press conference last month, Johnson talked abut how his MLB coaching experience helped him on his journey to Athens, Ga.

“You get to the big leagues and the game is so fast,” Johnson said. “You understand how hard it is to maintain the level that those guys are at. As I went through there and was running the defensive side of the ball so to speak, the pitching, running the bullpen, winning back-to-back central titles, obviously making it to the playoffs. The knowledge I gained from that, you might learn in 10 years doing what I’m doing right now, and I was fortunate to get it in three and a half.”

Minnesota won the 2019 and 2020 AL Central titles with Johnson on Rocco Baldelli‘s staff. However, the team was never able to win le to win a postseason game. With the Twins, Johnson coached José Berríos, Rich Hill, Kenta Maeda, Martín Pérez, Jake Odorizzi and many other notable names.

His previous college coaching experiences included working with Dave Van Horn at Arkansas and John Cohen at Mississippi State.

Wes Johnson spent the past season working with Jay Johnson at LSU, helping the team win the Men’s College World Series this fall. He also helped develop Paul Skenes into one of the top two prospects in the 2023 MLB Draft.

He also said during his press conference, which was held prior to LSU’s run at Omaha, what he has learned from Jay Johnson.

“Jay’s recruiting aspect from the head coaching position is like nobody I’ve ever seen,” Johnson said. “And I’ve worked with obviously a couple of head coaches in our league as fellow colleagues and then turned into head coaches in this league. So learning the process of how Jay balances the recruiting and practice, so to speak, or player development is something that I’ll take away from him.”