MLB executive has harsh message for Tennessee’s Tony Vitello amid interest from the San Francisco Giants
Tennessee Vols fans are still waiting to hear whether Tony Vitello is going to leave Rocky Top to become the San Francisco Giants’ new manager.
Who would’ve thought that, in the middle of college football season, the biggest topic in Knoxville would be Tennessee Vols baseball coach Tony Vitello?
Vols fans are anxiously waiting to find out if Vitello will leave Tennessee to become the new manager of the San Francisco Giants.
News broke last Saturday that San Francisco had offered Vitello their manager’s job.
Vitello has continued to work at Tennessee — leading the Vols through multiple scrimmages since the news broke — as he ponders whether to take the job.
One MLB executive had a harsh message this week for Tony Vitello
As we wait to hear if Vitello will take the job with the Giants, there’s been plenty of debate about how he would fare as a manager in the big leagues.
Vitello has no MLB or minor league experience as a player or as a coach. He would be the first college coach without pro experience to be hired straight to an MLB manager’s job.
One of the main reasons San Francisco is interested in making such an unprecedented move is Vitello’s charismatic, fiery personality.
Not everyone in MLB, however, is a fan of Vitello’s personality.
One MLB executive told The San Francisco Chronicle this week that Vitello needs to be “humbled.”
“He is characterized by some as extremely charismatic, by others as cocky and arrogant,” wrote Ann Killion on Tuesday. “One MLB executive who has dealt with Vitello told the Chronicle that the Tennessee coach needed ‘to be humbled.’”
There’s no doubt that Vitello is a fiery and competitive coach who wears his emotions on his sleeve. But anyone who watches Vitello speak regularly to reporters knows that he usually comes across as humble — almost always deflecting praise to others around him. If anything, Vitello is one of the most self-deprecating coaches in college baseball.
Maybe that MLB executive just had a bad experience with Vitello. Either way, it seems clear that if Vitello makes the jump to MLB, he’ll have to win over some detractors.