Danny White Press Conference: Tony Vitello takes San Francisco Giants manager job

Danny White Press Conference: Tony Vitello takes San Francisco Giants manager job

All right, good afternoon. Appreciate y’all coming in on short notice. Uh I don’t have to tell you the news of the day. Our head baseball coach has accepted uh uh the manager position at the San Francisco Giants. So uh in my mind, this is not a a sad day, it’s a proud day. Uh congratulations to Tony. Uh this is something that’s never been accomplished before. So, I think it’s a testament to uh obviously Tony uh but everybody that’s ever played for him, coached for him, our fans that have supported the program. We’ve had an unprecedented run of success the last four or five years. Uh and uh what he has built is is absolutely phenomenal. I was looking at the numbers. When Tony first got here, our budget was three and a half million. It’s 14 million today. We have the top budget in college baseball. We’re building a $ 109 million stadium. Uh we’re as aggressive as anybody in the country in the revshare NIL space. I think we have a top three maybe the best baseball job in America. So, uh we need to make sure my my focus is making making sure that we’re managing this transition uh in a in a a judicious way. Uh the the players are our number one priority right now. I’ll be visiting with them later today uh as I always do uh embarking on on on a search. I’ll be letting them know I’ve asked Frank Anderson to serve as our interim uh head coach. Uh uh the terminology I used with Frank is uh uh uh I need a shepherd right now. I need a day-to-day leader. And his response was, “Not that long ago, I was one of the most fiery baseball coaches in the country and you’re asking me to be a shepherd.” I said, “Coach, that’s exactly what I’m asking you to do. Uh I’m asking uh Josh Elander to be a candidate. Uh and we are going to uh uh uh conduct a national search uh and uh expect a ton of interest uh because of what Tony and his staff and and our fan base and everyone has built here. I think it’s an extremely attractive position. Uh obviously a little bit unique time of year. Uh, I’m going to work as fast as I can and uh uh uh get through this process and uh eliminate the uncertainty that our players are feeling right now as quickly as possible. Uh we have a lot of talent here and expect to have an extremely competitive baseball team this spring. Uh so um uh uh that’s uh I think what I wanted to address today. Jason, I leave anything out in terms of logistics. Uh meet with the team later today as I always do. I’ll ask for them to uh vote on a leadership group. I’ll meet with that per that group more in depth tomorrow. Uh I want them to have a voice in this process. Uh and we’ll get started uh on our search as as quickly as we possibly can. So with that, I’ll uh open up to any questions. I know there’s a lot out there. This has been a unique process in terms of how public it’s been. There’s been a whole lot of uh rumor mill going on. So I want y’all to ask me anything you want. I think you’ll uh enjoy maybe some facts. Go ahead. Danny, you characterize or can you characterize the relationship you’ve had with Tony since you’ve been here? And what has the last five days been like from a communication standpoint with him as he went through this decision and you guys went through, you know, kind of where he was with it? Yeah, I mean, no different than any of our coaches. I I think uh I have a great relationship with Tony. Um uh I I don’t work as closely with him as our sport administrator does. In this case was Tyler Johnson for the majority of his time here. Um but uh uh we do that. That’s kind of how we’re structured. Uh but uh I do uh appreciate obviously what Tony built for our baseball program, but also we also saw how invested he was to our athletic department and uh showing up at games and and supporting our teams. And uh in terms of uh more recently uh he he’s been proactive. I mean this thing goes back a few weeks. Um and uh he’s been good about uh and appreciate I appreciate how he’s been proactive in keeping me in the loop and uh informing me informing me every step of the way. Danny, there’s been a lot of rumors about NIL allocations and baseball funds going toward women’s basketball, things of that nature. Do you have any comment on that and how have you approached the rev share in NIL across the athletics department? Yeah, sure. Uh, first I think we’d all should anybody that’s participated. Where did that rumor come from? Anybody report that in here? So, who reported it? Like, somebody had to make up something that’s not true for it to become a rumor, right? Uh, so I think we should all collectively apologize to Kim Caldwell and our women’s basketball program because that’s factually incorrect. Never happened. Our revshare numbers are uh consistent with the the House settlement. uh 5% for women’s basketball, 15% for men’s basketball, 75% for football, uh five percent for other. We with that other bucket which is 900,000, we uh distributed 750,000 to our baseball program. Uh that is far from what we do for baseball or for any sport. Uh like all the most competitive programs in the country, we participated in front loading last spring. Baseball was a beneficiary of that. Uh we are uh supporting baseball. Uh uh I think at a well I know at a higher level than anybody in America. Um we are full scholarships in baseball all 34 spots. We were one of the first schools to sprint to that. I think we’re the only school in the country that’s also doing cost of attendance on top of that. That was about a $1.2 million new investment this year that uh a sport like women’s basketball wouldn’t have gotten. Uh and we do more uh with revshare and with NIL packages for baseball on top of uh their revshare. I know what the competitive space is in the SEC and across the country. I know our baseball program is extremely well equipped. Otherwise, we wouldn’t be recruiting at the level we are. Danny, two questions. Uh, in terms of the interim, why the move with Frank now instead of maybe Josh who who would step in when Tony was not present. And secondly, do you have a timeline? I know you said as soon as possible. Do you have a timeline for when you want this whole thing wrapped up? Um, you know, obviously over the course of the next couple weeks. Yeah, combination of factors. Frank’s obviously been a head coach. Uh but probably more importantly as quickly as I’d like to move. I’d like Josh to be able to focus on his candidacy and uh he’s kind of in the middle of all this too. There was a up until this morning, the entire staff didn’t know the decision that that Tony was going to make. So he’s been focused on recruiting and coaching his players. We have an incoming class. There’s a lot going on. Uh and uh I didn’t want to throw this on him now uh while while also uh uh maybe treating an interview as an as a as an afterthought. I want to be able to focus on uh on uh the interview process. You had any communication with Josh or Frank before this morning. And what is your relationship with Josh like? Uh I I don’t make a common practice of be becoming chummy with our assistant coaches. I think that there’s a chain of command that that would be uh inappropriate uh to have social relationships with them. But uh for the first time last night, I I visited with both each of them individually uh and uh talked about this plan. At that point in time, it was uh a contingency plan. We didn’t know the decision that Tony was going to make. Um but uh have had a chance again to visit with him more today and look forward to doing that more as we bark embark on the search process. There’s been some talk too about roster size in this sport. um what it can be in the spring, what some teams are right now. There’s numbers 45, 44, 39, 34. What is the roster number and where does Tennessee’s roster number compare to its competitors at this point? Um uh our roster numbers, uh have all changed with the House settlement post July 1. Um and they’re consistent with our scholarship numbers now, which is a great thing for a sport like baseball. We used to be capped at 11.7 scholarships and now there is no cap. So, uh, we have 34 roster spots and, uh, 34 full scholarships. Uh, with the the first year and the designated student athlete, uh, opportunities, there’s there’s an a chance to be somewhat flexible, but once we get out of the period with DSAs, there’s going to be zero flexibility. So, uh, all of our coaches uh, for all 20 sports were informed of what the roster numbers are over a year ago. Uh and uh uh uh the expectation for all of our head coaches uh is to to meet your roster spot. It’s a part of the job. Uh uh we have to be compliant with the house settlement. And we also have title nine considerations. We have to balance our number of uh uh uh participants on on rosters with uh men versus women across all of our sports. Has to be consistent with the student body uh across the campus. Uh and then also the scholarship allocation from a grant and aid perspective. So there’s um uh roster numbers are important for every sport. Uh but I think they’re they’re an easy thing to manage. Uh uh we just need our coaches to hit their numbers. You you kind of referenced the time of year that this is taking place. How unorthodox is it to conduct a baseball coaching search in October? And then you also said this is a top three job. Does that make it easier even despite it being maybe a different time of year? We’re going to find out. You know, I I I’m going into this with open eyes. Um like I’ve said to you guys before and uh relative to coaching searches, interviews matter. Uh I I won’t ultimately know uh what the right decision is till I go through that process and get an opportunity to compare candidates against each other and uh uh to hear from our student athletes, all that stuff. Um uh uh but I expect that there’s even though it’s a a a difficult time of year, I I expect that there’s going to be a a ton of interest because of what Tony’s built here, what we’ve all collectively built here, our players, our fans, our donors, everybody contributing to that awesome new facility that’ll open up this season. Kind of on that note, and you touched on a little bit, is there anything specific you’re looking for in this coaching hire? Maybe recruiting, maybe, you know, hitting pitching. Is there anything specific in in terms of what your ideal candidate is, age, experience, anything like that? Uh, nothing specific. I’ll I’ll the first data point for me will be hearing more directly from that leaders leadership group of the student athletes what they’re experiencing right now. Um, it you know, a lot of times when you go into a coaching search, you’re it’s because there’s uh the team isn’t having the kind of success you want to have. So, how do we make things better? But we’re obviously 18 months removed from a national championship and just lost our coach to the big leagues for the first time in the history of college baseball. So we we we have a positive momentum and uh a a good thing going, but I still want to hear their perspective uh and uh uh uh learn from that and and then and then go into the process. But I I don’t have anything in particular in mind. Uh maybe building off of that, you jokingly mentioned to Frank Anderson, you’re running a shepherd for the program. Is that also something that is a high priority for you and the next head coach? Uh not necessarily. I I I think I I use that term because like right now the kids need to know who’s the head coach. They they need that there’s there’s got to be somebody in charge. So, in any kind of coaching transition, I’m always like immediately we have to have an interim coach. Uh, that interim coach might be in that role for four days. It might be a lot longer than that. I don’t know. But, um, there’s got to be you got to fill that void. So, that that’s where the term shepherd came from in my in my mind. In your conversations with the players, what are you going to try to do to incentivize them to stay here at Tennessee rather than entering the transfer portal and going elsewhere? Um, I always uh in every single transition encourage the players not to to let their emotions get the the best of them. Uh, focus on their academics, focus on baseball right now. Uh, uh, I’ll be telling them some of the things I’ve told you. So, I’m going to work as fast as I can to try to eliminate that uncertainty for them as quickly as I can. And then I’ll be asking them to give the the the new head coach and coaching staff, however that plays out. In this case, it might be something that’s very familiar for them. It might be something that’s different. I I don’t know. Um, but ask them to to uh assess what that looks like really for their own best interests. uh they have a tremendous opportunity here at Tennessee and like every student athlete we have here if if they choose to do something different then that’s their decision. Questions will there be a search firm used in this? Is there anybody that you lean on, a former player who’s in the in the sport or has, you know, to to help you gain some further background on on potential candidates out there? What resources do you use in this search besides yourself? Uh, I’ll I’m using Parker Executive Search who I’ I’ve used for several coaching searches here. Um, and uh they are already uh work working on a on a plan on the logistics. I use them to to help set up interviews that they don’t pick who we interview. I do that. Um I’ve been assessing I’m always assessing the market for all of our sports and um but I’ve been assessing uh knowing this was a possibility for a while. Um uh uh but uh um uh what was your second question? Oh, baseball. Yeah, I I think in in every search I I try to lean on people I trust in the sport that know more more about it than I do. Uh and um I’ll be looking for opportunities to do that here, too. Uh two-parter for you. First, what is your message to V Nation? Obviously, they are not happy that their national championship head coach is leaving for the big leagues. Um and then the second part of that, I know you’ve mentioned Frank, you’ve me mentioned Josh as well. Do you expect Tony to take any of his staff with him or what does that kind of look like? I don’t know. I Tony and I haven’t talked about that. We spoke earlier today. I’m not sure that he knows. He’s probably trying to figure things out himself. Uh I I would venture to guess he probably doesn’t know yet. Um, so, uh, I I think I I visited with our entire staff, uh, earlier today and, uh, told them that, uh, we have every intention of, uh, making sure that they’re in a good place. Um, and that they need to do what’s best for their career. I get that, whether that’s in San Francisco or here or somewhere else. Um, but we’re not going to we’re not going to leave anybody out in the cold. Uh, this is a staff that’s done a lot for this university and, uh, we’ll make sure that they’re they’re in a good place. Uh what was your question about the fans? Uh I I don’t know anybody but he’s happy that Tony Vitello is not our coach anymore. We won a national championship and won a historic amount of games. Uh but I also think that we should be happy for him. This is a decision that he made. Uh that uh is it’s a pretty phenomenal accomplishment. Um, so I I I go back to what I said at the beginning. I don’t think this is a sad day. I think this is a proud day. Uh, it’s a it’s a compliment to our program and what’s been accomplished here and it’s a certainly uh mostly a compliment to Tony. Just going off everything you’ve said, you intend to have a head coach in place then for the 26 season and there’s not a plan to have Frank operate as interim through that whole season. Correct. Uh, I’m not putting myself in a in a box with anything right now. This this is kind of unprecedented to have a a coaching transition this time of year. So, um, I I don’t know how this plays out. All right. Thanks, guys.