SAN FRANCISCO — New Giants supervisor Tony Vitello has a message for the fanbase on his first day of labor:
He has no thought how that is going to go.
“I wish I had an answer in my own head to be honest with you,” Vitello stated. “Because as I first got here, I was like, man, there are a lot of unknowns.”
There positive are.
Vitello is the primary supervisor in big-league historical past to leap immediately from a university baseball dugout — he was beforehand the supervisor on the College of Tennessee — to the very best degree of the sport. He’s buying and selling aluminum bats and partial scholarships for $200-million payrolls and stadiums that maintain six instances the folks as his former dwelling ballpark.
Maybe this leap was unprecedented for a cause.
However, as Vitello stated, “We’re in this together now, whether you like me or not.”
And reality be advised, it was laborious to not just like the man upon the Bay Space’s first impression.
Thursday was, in impact, a public job interview for Vitello. If you are available dealing with the extent of skepticism that naturally follows somebody who’s on his beforehand untreaded path, an introduction takes on a extra inquisitive tone.
However in his 40-plus minutes on the dais at Oracle Park, Vitello didn’t contact any of the hallmarks of the final two managerial press conferences the Giants have held: analytics and fundamentals.
No, as a substitute, the speak was of belief, confidence, and tradition.
And whereas Buster Posey and Vitello did spend an inordinate period of time describing after which rephrasing that description of what managers are anticipated to do, an underlying reality lower via:
Vitello is a folks individual — assured in himself however not threatened by different methods of going about issues.
“One of my most important responsibilities in this role is to be able to read a room and read people. I don’t always get it right, but I feel like I have a pretty good sense of that,” Posey stated. “I think with any hiring, there’s going to be a certain level of risk.”
Identified for his fiery character and borderline-viral moments at Tennessee (can something in faculty baseball really attain the mainstream?), Vitello got here throughout as clever, considerate, and, most significantly, genuine.
And he didn’t win a contest to land this job, both.
“As much as this feels out of the box, Tony’s name has been bouncing around Major League Baseball for a while,” Giants basic supervisor Zack Minasian stated. “Tennessee’s program has been top-notch… You get a sense for how he goes about it — his passion, his intellect… We kept coming back to [him].”
This may not work. There are extra causes to clarify why it gained’t than why it should. And the chance? Even Posey admits that’s vital right here.
However Vitello is the form of character that makes you comfy with the chance. It’s straightforward to see why he was such a terrific recruiter at Tennessee and why he’s beloved not solely in that state, however in clubhouses all around the large leagues the place his former Volunteers now play.
My goodness, he’s a far cry from Gabe Kapler, whose insecurity was his guiding power.
And what a departure from Bob Melvin, who tried to make no waves, lest he remind somebody that he was, in truth, being paid tens of millions to handle a big-league baseball workforce.
The Giants are perennial underperformers; there’s no cause San Francisco’s latest friends are the small-market Cardinals, Diamondbacks, and Reds. They should be up there with the big-market Dodgers, Phillies, and Mets.
However the calling card of this group has been to keep away from shedding too many video games moderately than making an attempt to win extra. And that philosophy has locked in mediocrity on the sector.
Posey continues to be extremely inexperienced in his job, however to his credit score, he has made transfer after transfer to counter that institutional malaise.
And this, extra so than even the Rafael Devers commerce, is the transfer that might basically change issues within the Bay.
For higher or for worse.
“We believe his leadership is not only going to impact our clubhouse, but it’s also going to impact our entire organization and fanbase,” Posey stated.
Good.
Fireplace could be damaging or cleaning. Both means, one thing is burning.
And if that makes you uncomfortable, I’ve to ask: What do the Giants must lose right here? What’s being held onto so dearly?
Vitello’s Tennessee groups performed with an edge. Whereas in that position, he has stated that “in between the lines there are no rules” and in contrast his workforce to UFC fighters. It’s an enormous, irreverent gesture to the pearl-clutching traditionalists who continually declare baseball must be performed in line with an unwritten code.
It’s a bunch that has been placated by the Giants for too lengthy.
No extra.
“He’s going to be okay with ruffling feathers,” Posey stated upon leaving the dais. “There’s an argument to be made that we’re lacking that severely right now. All the young players won’t like me, but I don’t like guys hugging before the game. I don’t like it. As a fan, I want there to be a little bit of friction at times.”
Posey could have simply that.
Kapler desperately wished to be favored, and Melvin simply wished to remain out of the way in which; Vitello doesn’t care if he’s hated, as long as his workforce has his again.
He was born to be the villain.
Maybe the feathers ruffled are with the Giants gamers themselves. We’ll discover out if that’s the case — and if it is a failed experiment — briefly order.
But when Vitello can rally his squad to play baseball his means — daring, brash, and ready to a degree of extra as to again all of it up — the Giants will develop one thing they haven’t had in an extended, very long time:
An id.
The Giants would be the most hated workforce in baseball.
And that will probably be a rousing success.
