Tennessee baseball pitching coach Frank Anderson is expected to leave the Vols to join Tony Vitello’s coaching staff with the San Francisco Giants, a source with direct knowledge of the situation told GoVols247.

Director of pitching performance Josh Reynolds will take over as Tennessee’s pitching coach, the source also confirmed.

Anderson was named Tennessee’s interim head coach after Vitello’s departure for the San Francisco Giants in October. He held the role for three days before Vols athletics director Danny White named Josh Elander head coach.

Anderson served as Vitello’s pitching coach for the last eight seasons. He was the head coach at Oklahoma State from 2004-12 where he went 329–208 in nine seasons. He guided the Cowboys to six NCAA Tournament appearances, including one super regional.

“We’ll be visiting with (the team) later today,” White said the day Vitello left for the Giants. “I’ll be letting them know I’ve asked Frank Anderson to serve as our interim head coach. The terminology I use with Frank is, 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.”

Anderson is regarded as one of the best pitching coaches in baseball. Tennessee has had 25 pitchers hear their names called in the MLB Draft under Anderson, with at least three being taken in each of the last four drafts. Four of those 25 players have been selected in the first round in Liam Doyle, Marcus Phillips, Chase Dollander and Garrett Crochet.

Throughout his career, Anderson has had 103 pitchers selected in the MLB Draft, including 10 first rounders. 15 pitchers were drafted during Anderson’s tenure at Houston. He also had 27 pitchers selected during his time at Oklahoma State, 15 picked while he was at Texas and 21 drafted during his 10 seasons with Texas Tech.

The Vols have finished in the top 20 nationally in ERA, WHIP and strikeout-to-walk ratio in each of the past seven seasons. Anderson’s pitching staffs throughout his career have finished among the top-25 in the country in ERA 18 times, including 11 top-10 rankings.

“Frank’s obviously been a head coach, but probably more importantly as quickly as I’d like to move — I’d like Josh (Elander) to build focus on his candidacy,” White said. “And he’s kind of in the middle of all this too. Up until this morning, the entire staff didn’t know the decision that Tony was going to make. So (Elander’s) been focused on recruiting and coaching our players. We have an incoming class. There’s a lot going on. And I didn’t want to throw this on them now while also maybe treating an interview as an afterthought. I want to be able to focus on the interview process.”