It's a bad look. He lied about it and was really only sorry because he got caught. And if he wasn't behind it, it says the players didn't really consider him important enough to matter. I think managers really can only lose games and not win them, and are more or less interchangeable.
Most do the same move in most situations. I think Hinch is a pretentious d-bag, but he is really no better or worse than most of the managers of the last 15 years. But, I thought Ausmus was basically a cookie cutter manager too. A manager's primary responsibility is to manage the bullpen and give guys a day off when they need them. His bullpen sucks, so most of the time it is just a roll of the dice. My biggest complaint is the way he manages the lefty vs lefty match up.
The thing that irked me about Gardenhire was the lineup was different everyday and players were always in different defensive positions.