At first Twins hitting coach Tom Brunansky was convinced his friend Bill Springman was joking.

“I thought he was messing around with me,” Brunansky said Saturday. “I asked him again: ‘Quit messing with me.’ He said, no, he just got fired. That was a shock.”

Including five total years as a Triple-A hitting coach, Springman just completed his 14th season with the Twins organization, so it was completely unexpected when his contract was not renewed after nine seasons in the role of minor-league hitting coordinator. Twins assistant general manager Rob Antony cited “philosophical differences” for the move, which was authorized by Twins director of minor league operations Brad Steil.

Springman, 57, spent most of his time at the top two minor-league levels, which have yielded big-league contributors such as Danny Santana, Kennys Vargas and Josmil Pinto in the past two seasons.

“Spring’s been here for a lot of years,” Brunansky said. “When I first came back to see if I liked doing the deal and if I was any good at it, he was my mentor.”

Four years ago, when Brunansky signed on in July 2010 as a Gulf Coast League hitting coach, Springman made a special trip back to Fort Myers to make sure the former all-star outfielder was settled in.

“For him to come down for a few days and evaluate me and help me and get me grounded — I still remember the day he handed me a sheet of drills,” Brunansky said. “I’m looking at it and going, ‘Geez, Spring. Just give me a few good ones.’ I still have that sheet. I kept the reference. Everything he’s given me, I still have. He was the one that instituted for me the hard-hit (percentage) and quality at-bats. There are a lot of Spring’s teachings that are in me.”

Twins outfielder Aaron Hicks was among many in the big-league clubhouse sorry to see Springman go.

“He’s good,” Hicks said. “He’s a guy that definitely is with all his guys. He likes his guys to be tough outs and always able to put the ball in play hard. He’s going to give you his best advice on how to see the ball better and how to make this game just a little bit easier for you.”

Video sessions with Springman weren’t as frequent, players said, but the former college coach and pro scout spent significant time talking with Twins minor leaguers about the mental side of the game.

“He was more of a mental coach than anything,” Twins catcher-outfielder Chris Herrmann said. “He didn’t want to change much about my swing. He just wanted to talk to me about the mental side of hitting. It was more about what to think about and what not to think about. I liked that. It made everything a lot more simple.”

Tim Doherty and former Twins outfielder Chad Allen, the hitting coaches at Triple-A Rochester and Double-A New Britain, respectively, figure to be among the top candidates to replace Springman. It’s also possible the Twins would go outside the organization.

No matter who is chosen, Brunansky plans to sit down with the new hitting coordinator to discuss philosophies and make sure the same consistency remains throughout the Twins system.

“I don’t know if they’ve even started thinking about it. I don’t know the direction they’re going to go,” Brunansky said. “But certainly, when they do come down to whoever it is, we’ll definitely sit down and discuss the direction, discuss the things that are important, and get a cohesive thought we want to carry through our system and through here. What we develop, we’re developing for this ballpark.”