The San Francisco Giants plan to bring back former Tennessee Vols baseball coach Tony Vitello for the 2027 season despite a rough debut in the big leagues in 2026. 

Giants President of Baseball Operations Buster Posey confirmed recently that he is bringing Vitello back. 

The San Francisco Chronicle, however, posed a question this week: Does Vitello want to return to the Giants, or does he want to return to college baseball?

As Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle noted, if Vitello “showed any inkling” that he’d like to step back into college baseball, there are “plenty of deep-pocket schools that would be happy to come to some sort of agreement with the Giants to free up Vitello from the remaining two years on his deal.”

There’s no doubt that plenty of schools would be stepping over top of each other to attempt to hire Vitello if he decided he wanted to return to college. But it sounds like his focus is solely on the Giants and continuing what he started in San Francisco.

Tony Vitello is committed to finishing what he started with the Giants

Vitello told the San Francisco Chronicle that he wants to leave the Giants franchise better than it was when he got there, and that he’s willing to “go through hell or high water” to do that.

He also said the only college sport in his immediate future is football.

It sounds like Vitello is planning to check out some SEC games in a place other than Neyland Stadium this fall, though he noted that he remains loyal to Tennessee.

“The only tie I have to college is I’m super juiced to go to college football games this year, and I still remain loyal to Tennessee,” said Vitello. “But now I can go to Tuscaloosa and not be criticized.”

Vitello believes he has things trending in the right direction in San Francisco after a rocky start. No one knows what the future holds, but he is clearly not going to give up. He’s committed to finishing what he started, and he’s not going to look for the easy way out.

“I think we’ve slowly started to do some things, and I’m willing to go to hell and back to make it look better on the field and for there to be improvement,” said Vitello. 

We’ll see what happens down the road. Eventually a decision may be made that takes things out of his hands. If Posey, the man who hired him, is let go, it probably means Vitello will be out the door as well.

But for now, Vitello believes he can make San Francisco a better team, and that’s where his focus is both short-term and long-term.