Souhan: Time to appreciate all Clare Duwelius, Katie Smith and Dave St. Peter gave to Twin Cities sports

The departures of Clare Duwelius, Katie Smith and Dave St. Peter leaves the Twin Cities sports scene a lesser place.

They were masters of the unappreciated work that drives franchises.

This past week, Duwelius left her position as general manager of the Minnesota Lynx to become executive vice president and general manager of Unrivaled, the women’s three-on-three basketball league founded in part by Lynx star Napheesa Collier.

Smith left her position as Lynx associate head coach to become an assistant coach at her alma mater, Ohio State.

Dave St. Peter retired as the Twins team president and CEO to take an advisory role with the team.

All three will be difficult to replace, just as, because of their roles, they were difficult to fully appreciate.

Take Duwelius. She worked her way up through the Lynx organization from the most menial jobs to become the primary adviser to basketball boss Cheryl Reeve. Last season, the Lynx overachieved grandly, going from middle-of-the-pack projections to within a basket of winning another WNBA title.

During the years when I spent time behind the scenes with the Lynx, I found Duwelius to be the kind of person who considered no task too small for her to tackle. She’d fix the coffee machine, break down video of a potential free agent, then throw passes to a player during shooting drills.

Smith, too, was known for putting in extra work. Last season, she helped the Lynx become the best three-point shooting team in the league, after finishing 11th in the 12-team league the season before.

She coached Kayla McBride and Bridget Carleton so well on shooting mechanics and mentality that both broke her Lynx franchise record for three-pointers made in a season.

Neither Duwelius nor Smith sought attention, but the players knew their value.

St. Peter followed a similar path to Duwelius, getting a low-level job with a big-league franchise and slowly climbing the organizational ladder.

What’s different about St. Peter is that he invested his entire adult life in THE … of one franchise.

He went from running the Twins pro shops you’d see in strip malls back in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s to becoming team president and eventually CEO. He’s one reason the Twins went from threats of relocation and contraction in the late ‘90s to becoming a stable franchise with a state-of-the-art ballpark.

I know St. Peter better than Duwelius and Smith, in part because I spent months doing a profile of St. Peter after Target Field opened.

I came away from that assignment with two strong memories:

Every Twins employee I spoke with, on and off the record, marveled that St. Peter knew virtually everyone’s job better than they did.

Before games, St. Peter would walk through the bars at Target Field, thanking employees, and then walk through the stands to thank ushers. He knew everyone’s name.

St. Peter also ranked among the most accessible team presidents in all of professional sports.

He ranked among the most forthcoming, too.

During a series of interviews, he volunteered that his dedication to his job cost him his marriage. During my many years covering the franchise, I had always found that Twins employees worked almost untenable schedules. St. Peter agreed, and vowed to make working for the franchise a better experience.

Without Duwelius and Smith, the Lynx might not have produced a magical season in 2024.

Without St. Peter (and his predecessor, Jerry Bell), the Twins might not have Target Field, or a Minnesota zip code.

Duwelius is positioned to be a power player in a promising new league. She could run a WNBA franchise if she so chooses.

Smith should be a head coach in the WNBA or college, and probably will be when the time is right for her.

St. Peter? His retirement will probably consist of going to lots of ballgames, and if anybody with the Twins calls, he’ll probably pick up before the second ring.