College of Tennessee baseball coach Tony Vitello has emerged as a frontrunner for the San Francisco Giants’ managerial job, and a decision on a possible deal is predicted within the subsequent 24 to 72 hours, sources informed ESPN, confirming a number of studies.
Ought to the perimeters agree on a contract, Vitello would turn into the primary supervisor in main league historical past to leap straight from a university program to the large leagues with out expertise in knowledgeable group.
Vitello, 47, led Tennessee to a Faculty World Sequence title in 2024 and is considered probably the greatest coaches in school baseball. He would exchange Bob Melvin, who was fired Sept. 29 following an 81-81 season, the Giants’ fourth consecutive season and not using a playoff berth.
San Francisco president of baseball operations Buster Posey has thought-about numerous managerial candidates, amongst them former Giants catcher Nick Hundley and a pair of different large league catchers, Kurt Suzuki and Vance Wilson. The Giants have as an alternative educated their curiosity on Vitello, who has distinguished himself as one of many preeminent recruiters and expertise builders within the nation throughout a two-decade profession as an assistant and head coach in school.
The buyout on his deal at Tennessee is $3 million, the identical as his annual wage, sources mentioned.
The transfer from school to skilled baseball is uncommon although not unprecedented. Milwaukee Brewers supervisor Pat Murphy spent 25 years in school earlier than becoming a member of the San Diego Padres, with whom he managed within the minor leagues. Murphy then spent eight years as Brewers bench coach earlier than taking up as supervisor in 2024, when he gained Nationwide League Supervisor of the 12 months.
Vitello’s transition to the main leagues would come at a much more speedy tempo. He would inherit a Giants workforce competing in a loaded Nationwide League West, with the division-winning Los Angeles Dodgers clinching a World Sequence berth Friday evening. San Francisco returns a core of first baseman Rafael Devers, shortstop Willy Adames and third baseman Matt Chapman and is predicted to be energetic in free company this winter, sources mentioned.
Following greater than 10 years as an assistant coach at Missouri, TCU and Arkansas, Vitello took over a moribund Tennessee program earlier than the 2018 season and posted a 341-131 report, advancing to the Faculty World Sequence in 2021, 2023 and 2024. With a pair of eventual first-round picks and 4 second-rounders, Tennessee beat Texas A&M to win the varsity’s first baseball nationwide championship.
Vitello, whose boisterous persona endeared him at Tennessee and chafed different SEC colleges, would enter a wholly totally different realm in MLB. Whereas school jobs are sometimes outlined by the success of recruiting lessons, main league groups are constructed by baseball-operations departments, with the supervisor relied upon for clubhouse cohesion, in-game decision-making, bullpen utilization and day by day media interactions.
The reticence of MLB groups to dip into the school ranks for managers is lengthy established and has run counter to the hiring practices of different skilled sports activities leagues. NFL groups have often plucked head coaches from the school ranks, and within the NBA, there is no such thing as a stigma related to school coaches. The closest facsimile to Vitello’s hiring was in 2019, when pitching coach Wes Johnson left the College of Arkansas to take the identical function with the Minnesota Twins. Johnson left the Twins in 2022 to simply accept the pitching-coach job at LSU earlier than becoming a member of Georgia as its head coach a yr later.
Vitello’s philosophies on the sport and persona intrigued Posey and aligned with what the longer term Corridor of Famer hopes to construct in San Francisco, sources mentioned. In an interview with ESPN in June, Vitello mentioned his fame as a rabble-rouser didn’t hassle him and that he had no plans to alter his method to teaching, which referred to as for boundary-pushing.
“I believe you do not know the place the road is till you cross it. And you then make an adjustment,” Vitello mentioned. “I do not need our guys, if they offer them a coloring e book, I do not need them simply coloring contained in the traces. You already know, provide you with one thing totally different.”