{"id":549716,"date":"2026-02-02T00:41:15","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T00:41:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/549716\/"},"modified":"2026-02-02T00:41:15","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T00:41:15","slug":"tony-vitellos-san-fransisco-giants-make-splash-free-agent-signing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/549716\/","title":{"rendered":"Tony Vitello&#8217;s San Fransisco Giants Make Splash Free Agent Signing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Tony-Vitello.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-179747\" src=\"data:image\/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns=\" http:=\"\" alt=\"Tony Vitello\" width=\"745\" height=\"483\" data-lazy- data-lazy- data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Tony-Vitello.jpg\"\/><\/a>Photo via the San Francisco Giants on X (Twitter)\/ @SFGiants<\/p>\n<p>The San Fransisco Giants made a splash free agent signing Saturday night ahead of Tony Vitello\u2019s first season as the organization\u2019s manager. Veteran utility infielder Luis Arraez signed a one-year contract worth $12 million with the Giants, the <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/MLB\/status\/2017765357138649089?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">New York Post\u2019s Joel Sherman first reported.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Arraez is one of the best contact hitters in baseball winning the batting title three-straight years from 2022-2024. He had a bit more modest 2025 season, hitting .292 with eight home runs, 30 doubles and 61 RBIs with the San Diego Padres.<\/p>\n<p>The left-handed hitting infielder is of a dying breed in baseball. Arraez struck out only 21 times during the 2025 season for a nearly impossibly low 3.1% strikeout rate. Over the course of his seven-year career, Arraez is hitting .317 with 36 home runs, 169 doubles and 308 RBIs.<\/p>\n<p>Arraez has also bounced around a great deal. He began his MLB career with the Minnesota Twins before playing for the Miami Marlins, Padres and now the San Fransisco Giants.<\/p>\n<p>More From RTI:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.rockytopinsider.com\/2026\/02\/01\/see-tennessee-baseball-hitters-walkup-songs-for-the-2026-season\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">See Tennessee Baseball Hitters Walkup Songs For The 2026 Season<\/a><\/p>\n<p>One of the main knocks on Arraez is his defense. He plays first, second and third base but is not a great defender at any spot which has led to him spending a large chunk of his as a designated hitter. According to Giants lineup projections, Arraez will likely play second base for the Giants next season.<\/p>\n<p>Vitello and Arraez are looking to elevate San Fransisco to a different level after going 81-81 during the 2025 season and finishing two games back of making the playoffs. The Giants have been a model of mediocrity over the last four seasons, winning between 79 and 81 games in the four seasons since they went 107-55 in 2021.<\/p>\n<p>President of Baseball Operations Buster Posey went outside the box this offseason, hiring Vitello as his new manager despite the Tennessee head coach having no professional baseball experience as a player, scout or coach. Vitello left Tennessee after a highly-successful nine-year stint that included three trips to the College World Series and the 2024 National Championship.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo via the San Francisco Giants on X (Twitter)\/ @SFGiants The San Fransisco Giants made a splash free&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":418726,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2408],"tags":[5,162,85,4,378,66,20556,4343,4340,4344,4341,4342,1870],"class_list":{"0":"post-549716","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-francisco-giants","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-giants","10":"tag-luis-arraez","11":"tag-mlb","12":"tag-san-francisco","13":"tag-san-francisco-giants","14":"tag-san-fransisco-giants","15":"tag-sanfrancisco","16":"tag-sanfranciscogiants","17":"tag-sf","18":"tag-sf-giants","19":"tag-sfgiants","20":"tag-tony-vitello"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115998260369158976","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=549716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/549716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/418726"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=549716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=549716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=549716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}