Having had their fill of experience on the managerial end of things, Toronto FC is turning to innocence to lead the problem franchise.

Tim Bezbatchenko, 31, is expected to be unveiled as the team’s new general manager at a BMO Field press conference on Friday morning.

Most of the men in the GM ranks of Major League Soccer are unfamiliar to casual fans. Even by that measure, it’s fair to call Bezbatchenko an unlikely choice. He’s a name even very clued-in followers of the league will have trouble placing.

Historically, TFC management hires have fallen into two categories: former top-level pros with little experience (Aron Winter, Paul Mariner, Ryan Nelsen) or well-travelled fast talkers (Mo Johnston, Kevin Payne).

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Bezbatchenko is neither. He is, by all reports, a soccer wonk. Trained as a lawyer, Bezbatchenko has no management experience at the club level. He is a stats guy and a contracts expert most comfortable working in the background. It’s unlikely he’ll be seen at team practices in shorts and cleats.

Most recently, Bezbatchenko worked at MLS’s New York head office as the league’s senior director of player relations and competition.

In that role, he handled all of the league’s contracts with players. Since MLS is organized as a single-entity ownership, wherein all the players are signed and paid directly by the league, Bezbatchenko was in effect the league’s GM.

Those are impressive bona fides, especially considering how poor previous club bosses proved at identifying talent and improving the squad via trades.

Throughout its history, Toronto FC has not been able to acquire a backbone of North American players that typifies the league’s most successful clubs. Few people in the game will have as good a handle on that issue as Bezbatchenko.

Bezbatchenko also had a brief career as a pro, playing midfield for the Pittsburgh Riverhounds of the United Soccer Leagues for two seasons.

He is part of a new breed taking over the league who lean more on spreadsheets than scouting trips. The vanguard of that movement is 40-year-old Real Salt Lake GM Garth Lagerwey. Like Bezbatchenko, Lagerwey was a fringe professional player who trained as a lawyer. He also came to Utah with little experience. Since taking over a terrible side in 2007, Lagerwey’s teams have never missed the playoffs.

Lagerwey was on the first draft of TFC’s wish list to succeed ousted president Kevin Payne, though Bezbatchenko ranked highly throughout the process.

As part of the courtship, Bezbatchenko prepared two detailed reports laying out his vision for the club. One club insider described the first of them as “the best thing I’ve ever read.”

This sort of interview process is in stark contrast to past hiring practices.

The most disastrous of those was the hiring of Dutchman Aron Winter. He arrived based solely on the very expensive recommendation of current U.S. national team coach Jurgen Klinsmann. TFC bought Winter’s pitch based entirely on his pedigree as a player trailing lots of high-level European glamour.

When put into practice in an unfamiliar environment, Winter’s ideas were non-starters. His biggest failing? Finding and attracting talent.

Bezbatchenko may be new to his current position, but unlike some other TFC leaders, he has an unusually wide depth of knowledge when it comes to the league as a whole.

That’s the press release. The downside is a club that now fields what is likely the most callow coach/GM tandem in North American sport. Between them, Bezbatchenko and coach Ryan Nelsen have less than seven months’ experience.

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They will have six months during which to prepare for next season. That time will certainly include major turnover of the current roster, and, more hopefully, the signing of two new designated players.

The hope will be that this latest tandem of generals — average age 33 — are the first in team history who come armed with a workable battle plan.

MORE:The Star’s soccer page