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As a 9-year-old, Tony Vitello was at Busch Stadium when Will Clark slid hard into second base, igniting a wild Giants-Cardinals brawl. At 36, he was at Kauffman Stadium when Madison Bumgarner famously came out of the bullpen, pitching five innings to secure the Giants’ third World Series title in five years.
As a kid, Vitello tried to emulate Kevin Mitchell’s celebrated barehanded catch. One of his good friends is Bill Mueller, who played high school ball for his father in St. Louis. He said of his new uniform number, 23, “I guess it’s fun to know you’re surrounded by legends.”
Yes, Vitello realizes 22 and 24 belonged to Clark and Willie Mays. In fact, he has so many stories about the Giants and links to the franchise that his hiring as the next manager seems that it was meant to be. Especially with how he impressed Buster Posey during the interview process and the masses at Thursday’s introductory news conference at Oracle Park.
“I have spent some time around the organization either as a fan or just watching or through business ways,” said Vitello, who attended Giants games when he was playing and coaching for the Salinas Packers collegiate summer team in the early 2000s. “I’m fully aware of the tradition that’s here.”
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Vitello answered many questions at the dais and many more afterward on the side. He could have chatted about the Giants all day if PR man Matt Chisholm hadn’t eventually pulled him away for other scheduled duties.
What we know about the 47-year-old Vitello, who arrived in San Francisco after a highly successful stint at the University of Tennessee, is that he’s a smooth talker. An eloquent speaker. An effective communicator. Most of all, an experienced leader.
And a proven winner. In Knoxville, he turned a struggling program into a national power. Whether that will translate to the big leagues was the biggest question of the day, and he’ll be answering it through the winter, into spring training, and all of next season.
A prototypical college coach and recruiter who used plenty of rah-rah tactics to get his players psyched up to pound the opposition, Vitello is moving from a 56-game college schedule to a 162-game grind in the big leagues, where players try not to get too high or too low, as the cliche goes, or get caught up in the daily emotions.
Asked whether he now needs to tone down the energy, he quipped, “I think if you ask my mom, she’d ask me to tone it down. But if you ask my dad, he’d say kick it up a notch.”
In other words, we shall see how all this evolves.
“I wish I had an answer in my own head, to be honest with you,” Vitello said. “There are a lot of unknowns and just a lot of wonder in my mind. You can ask people and draw on previous information. But until you live it out, you don’t know what it’s going to be like.”
Posey thinks he has a pretty good idea. He’s the one who took a chance – and put his legacy on the line – on someone with no pro experience as a player, coach or manager to help bring the franchise back to prominence. The Giants have missed the postseason eight times in nine years, and Posey went way out of the box on Vitello.
So much so that the Giants not only agreed to a three-year contract paying Vitello $3.5 million a year but paid his $3 million buyout at Tennessee. They’re also on the hook for Bob Melvin’s $4 million salary next season. That’s a $10.5 million risk.
Posey has that much faith.
“He has a vision to be great, not just for himself, but that’s going to rub off on those around him,” Posey said. “There’s an expectation that he’ll get the best from everybody he comes in contact with. Tony’s a teacher, motivator, tireless worker, someone who understands how to build culture. We believe his leadership will not only impact our clubhouse but also our organization and entire fan base as well.”
The Giants interviewed a handful of candidates including Nick Hundley, Brandon Hyde, Kurt Suzuki, and Vance Wilson, and had conversations with others. Throughout the process, according to Posey and general manager Zack Minasian, Vitello’s name kept resurfacing.
“I’ll give Zack credit,” Posey said. “He was the one who first had the thought.”
Minasian said he heard Vitello’s name pop up last winter in managerial talk. Vitello already was familiar with the scouting department and senior amateur scouting director Michael Holmes, who sat in many draft rooms pondering the idea of drafting Vitello’s players, and had actually spoken with Posey before the draft to discuss his players. Tennessee infielder Gavin Kilen was the Giants’ first-round pick in July, and Posey traded for two other former Volunteers at the July 31 deadline: Drew Gilbert and Blade Tidwell.
When the Giants played in Denver in early September, Vitello was at Coors Field to meet with some of his former players including Gilbert and the Rockies’ Jordan Beck and Chase Dollander. Vitello and Posey crossed paths – “positive impression but small amount of time,” Posey said.
Melvin was fired one day after the season, and the hunt for a successor began. When Minasian brought up Vitello’s name, Posey had immediate interest in a conversation.
“The more we talked about it, the more we all became intrigued. … Obviously it struck a chord with him,” Minasian said.
Posey added, “I’d say from the get-go, he felt like he was going to be a guy that we were really interested in, and then it just kept progressing that way.”
Vitello recalled a text from Posey that was career changing. He was on a recruiting flight but had no Wi-Fi and didn’t receive the text until landing. It basically stated that Posey wanted to talk about the possibility of managing.
“The season had ended. They had made some moves here. I kind of said, ‘Oh hell’ to myself. ‘Here we go. This could be something,’” Vitello said. “From there, it was awesome. They took their time. They gave me space. They gave me a bunch of information. The people I was able to lean on were incredible to me, a lot of people who went way out of the way trying to not influence me but give me good information.”
Vitello continued his coaching duties in Knoxville while engaging in countless discussions with Giants personnel – at one point flying into San Francisco for extensive interviews – and people he trusts in the industry. Two of the more impactful chats were with former Giants managers Bruce Bochy and Dusty Baker. The Giants continued to interview other candidates – Hundley seemed a favorite until he pulled back – but it didn’t take long for the brain trust to focus on Vitello.
Then came hashing out negotiations with his agent, Jimmy Sexton. No simple task.
“A little bit of negotiating, trying to get the numbers right,” Posey said. “My sense was that it was for him to get to a place mentally where he could say ‘I’m going to leave this university and take on this endeavor.’ ”
A defining moment in the process came Oct. 20.
“The closest this looked to reality was a conversation me and Buster had after Game 7 of the Mariners and Blue Jays,” Vitello said. “It was pretty late at night, even on this coast. It kind of bled into the next day.”
Two days later, the morning of Oct. 22, Vitello met with his coaching staff – “the final box that was checked.” Shortly thereafter, the Giants announced Vitello as the 40th manager in club history.
Thursday, Vitello said all the right things.
“No one wants to see (Tennessee) go to Omaha (for the College World Series) more than me. But I tell you whose wins I’d enjoy more than Tennessee’s: San Francisco Giants’.”
“The records that have been set by guys like (Barry) Bonds and Mays and (Tim) Lincecum and everybody else. … There’s a lot to learn from the past.”
“You could argue this is the best home jersey in all of Major League Baseball.”
Up next, Vitello will begin assembling his coaching staff. He said Thursday he’s had preliminary conversations, but has yet to make any official hires.
The Giants’ new manager attended the World Series opener and the historic 18-inning Game 3, insisting he stayed until the bitter end. As for the Dodgers, who continue to dominate the National League West, Vitello said the focus is more about the Giants for now, not their competition.
“You’ve got to be careful about not getting caught up with what others are doing,” he said. “The most important people and place are pretty much where we are right now.”