If the team returns to its normal, .500-ish ways, perhaps new manager Tony Vitello isn\u2019t as closely scrutinized, and he becomes just another manager. That is not the case at the moment. With the Giants still underwater, you will notice the atypical decisions and comments.<\/p>\n
So I\u2019ve rounded up a few of the complaints that I\u2019ve seen more than once, and I\u2019ll chime in on whether the criticisms are justified or unjustified. It won\u2019t be a complete list, but that\u2019s what the comments are for.<\/p>\n
Start with the easiest one to evaluate:<\/p>\n
Complaint: Until he cools down, Daniel Susac needs to play over Patrick BaileyVerdict: Absolutely not<\/p>\n
A lot of the below quirks are fixable with experience or time, if they\u2019re things that need to be fixed at all. They are something to notice more than they\u2019re something to revolt against, at least for now. If you had complaints, they would have been secondary if Vitello\u2019s response to the early-season weirdness were to start pulling at different threads, benching veterans and everyday players, searching for the hot hand. It would have made him look like a novice blackjack player with $20 left, sweaty and splitting cards he shouldn\u2019t be splitting. It would have been one of the biggest red flags possible.<\/p>\n
The first time a manager sits a veteran in a game the veteran expects to start, it had better be for a better reason than \u201ca rookie\u2019s first five plate appearances.\u201d Bailey might be one of the more frustrating valuable players in the game. If you go stat-shopping, you can claim that his defense makes him one of the more valuable players in baseball, even if he hits like a backup catcher. The problem is that he hits like a backup catcher, and he\u2019s been even worse to start the 2026 season. But if the Giants are going to have a successful 2026 season, Bailey is much, much more likely to be involved than Susac.<\/p>\n
The highest batting average on the 2000 Giants didn\u2019t belong to Barry Bonds, Jeff Kent or Ellis Burks. It didn\u2019t even belong to Terrell Lowery, who went 15-for-34 (.441\/.548\/.646). No, the highest average on that team was Damon Minor, who hit .444 (4-for-9) with two walks and three homers. His slugging percentage (1.444) was higher than anyone else\u2019s OPS that year, including the players who finished 1-2 in the National League MVP race.<\/p>\n
Those nine at-bats came toward the end of the season, though, when there weren\u2019t so many open-ended questions. So nobody was thinking that there should be a way for Minor to be the starting first baseman in the postseason. It was just a nice li\u2019l stretch where he looked like the actual Stretch.<\/p>\n
Susac might be the Giants\u2019 future at the catcher\u2019s position. Or he might never get a starting job and become one of their hitting coaches in a couple decades. Either way, it\u2019s still the first page of his story. At least finish the first chapter before making a consequential decision.<\/p>\n
Complaint: Vitello doesn\u2019t use his bench enoughVerdict: True<\/p>\n
The lack of platoon-based pinch-hitting<\/a> doesn\u2019t bother me much, if at all. The Giants offered you years of strict platoon fanaticism, and it wasn\u2019t very fun to watch. The correct move will eventually be Jared Oliva pinch-hitting for Jung Hoo Lee in the ninth inning, most likely, if we haven\u2019t gotten there already. But take the first month and let the platoon candidates prove that they\u2019re not platoon material. Fine by me.<\/p>\n This complaint is legitimate, though, because the idea of a \u201cbench\u201d also includes defensive replacements and spot starts, and it\u2019s absolutely absurd that Christian Koss didn\u2019t get an at-bat until Wednesday night, the 13th game of the season. The Giants have been blown out in games already this season, to the point where Koss had to pitch before he hit, which suggests that giving Willy Adames or Luis Arraez or anybody else a little extra rest wouldn\u2019t have been a problem. There should have been at least a couple of garbage-time at-bats for Koss already. The Giants\u2019 bench is filled with major leaguers who think they can start on one of the 30 MLB teams, not college kids who aren\u2019t an everyday player on one of the 300+ Division I college teams.<\/p>\n What actually happened was an example of why it\u2019s brutal to keep a major-league hitter out of action for that long. Koss came up in his first at-bat and scorched a 100-mph line drive into an out. Then he swung on the first pitch of his second at-bat and hit it to a second baseman playing directly behind the bag. It\u2019s hard to deal with the innate unfairness of hitting a baseball when getting everyday at-bats. Now imagine being the phantom at the end of the bench, never knowing when your next chance will be.<\/p>\n If it was a deliberate decision from Vitello to keep his everyday players in the lineup to show faith in his starters and prove that he\u2019s not going to panic, that\u2019s understandable. But there was a way to finesse Koss (and Oliva) into more playing time without tweaking noses. Hopefully, it\u2019s smoother going forward.<\/p>\n \n Has Tony Vitello\u2019s management of the Giants\u2019 makeshift bullpen been unusual thus far? (Thearon W. Henderson \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n Complaint: The bullpen usage is weirdVerdict: True<\/p>\n This is true, but with an asterisk. Experienced managers like Bob Melvin were given pretty detailed scenarios about when they should bring in Pitcher A to face Batter A, B or C, and while there was perhaps a little wiggle room, these are not the old days. For the most part, those decisions were only partially made by Melvin. Now imagine how it is for a manager who has never played professional baseball, much less managed a major-league bullpen.<\/p>\n What the Giants are doing right now is throwing spaghetti at the wall with their relievers and seeing whose spaghetti has the best spin rate. Or something to that effect. And if you listen to Vitello after the game<\/a> \u2026<\/p>\n \u201cThen you\u2019ve got this \u2014 well, you can\u2019t see it, maybe I shouldn\u2019t show it \u2014 you got all these boxes and data and I can show you guys what it says, and we\u2019re definitely using it, but we\u2019re not leaning on it,\u201d Vitello said. \u201cIt\u2019s not the only thing we use. Sometimes it can be a tiebreaker. Sometimes it\u2019s such a loud number that you do invest in the analytical side. And the rest is just who you think the best guy is down there.\u201d<\/p>\n He\u2019s describing a pitcher-go-brrrrrrr box, where it\u2019s telling you which pitchers are going brrrrrrrr and can strike out Shohei Ohtani nine times out of 10 if they\u2019re throwing this well and executing. That box suggested that Caleb Kilian was likelier to turn Trea Turner, Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper into three outs than anyone else available, even a left-hander.<\/p>\n Baggs called it a galaxy-brain move, which is more than appropriate, but it\u2019s one with shared responsibility. A manager can get only so wacky with his bullpen in the modern game. It takes a village to get completely wacky, and the Giants will continue working on it until they find a solid eight relievers.<\/p>\n Complaint: Vitello is overworking his bullpenVerdict: Not even close<\/p>\n Keaton Winn is the only reliever in the Giants\u2019 bullpen to throw in back-to-back outings so far this year. It was, perhaps coincidentally and perhaps not, his worst outing of the year. But if that\u2019s the most egregious example of misuse, the Giants might have the most delicately used bullpen in baseball.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a handy site that keeps track of reliever usage<\/a>. Scroll through it and marvel at all the back-to-backs for some of these teams. The Nationals\u2019 Cole Henry threw 16 pitches and took the loss on Tuesday, then came back and threw 43 pitches on Wednesday. If you\u2019re suspecting that the Giants are overworking their bullpen, it\u2019s because you\u2019re only watching two teams: the Giants and whoever they\u2019re playing. The other teams leave after a couple days, so you can\u2019t tell how hard they\u2019re worked.<\/p>\n This is, like the above, not entirely the purview of the manager. This is a group decision. So far, it\u2019s been limiting the pitches and workload of an inexperienced bullpen. Good.<\/p>\n Complaint: Vitello is clearly inexperiencedVerdict: You\u2019d better believe it<\/p>\n You can tell that Vitello hasn\u2019t played Major League Baseball. This is not a critique. This is a fact. It would be the same thing if a current major-league manager had to coach a college team, where the goals and aims and rules and vibes and pace and everything are slightly different. You\u2019ll notice the inexperience. It might take months to fade away. It might never happen.<\/p>\n The best analogy I have is a position change for a major leaguer. One of the most important things I learned from Russell Carleton<\/a>, who recently semi-retired from writing, was that even the most brilliant defenders in baseball struggle with a position change. There\u2019s so much that\u2019s different, from the angles, to the speed of the ball off the bat, to the footwork, et cetera. Ozzie Smith\u2019s defensive numbers would have taken a hit if he shifted to second base, at least initially.<\/p>\n Rafael Devers\u2019 defensive numbers would also take a hit if he shifts to second base, so let\u2019s be realistic. Somewhere in that Devers-to-Ozzie spectrum is Vitello\u2019s managerial ceiling, so to speak. He could still be the Ozzie Smith of deft managerial moves. He could be completely unqualified for the position, like Devers at second base.<\/p>\n All I know is that there will be quirks like what we\u2019ve seen until the experience accumulates. The Giants didn\u2019t hire a new manager to communicate pinch-hitting duties perfectly. They hired one to make the whole danged thing run smoothly. There will be hiccups before the smoothening, and you will notice them.<\/p>\n Complaint: Vitello needs to know he can not say thingsVerdict: True. But only if that\u2019s what he wants<\/p>\n Vitello\u2019s entire deal is connecting with people. It\u2019s why he\u2019s made it this far. He\u2019s trying to be honest, entertaining and engaging with reporters, but it\u2019s not the right format. He gets a few questions and a few minutes to explain, well, everything, and then he gets a few minutes after the game to answer questions about that specific game. In those minutes, he\u2019ll reference Lil Wayne or Teddy Roosevelt and go on tangents, occasionally making you scratch your head.<\/p>\n He\u2019ll eventually decide if it\u2019s worth it. If he\u2019s sincere about ignoring people like me \u2014 and he should be, as should you \u2014 he\u2019ll stick with the personality. If he\u2019s tired of hearing about it, or if it somehow starts to affect play on the field, he\u2019ll keep his head down and give 110 percent and come back tomorrow to give the same quotes as a generic store-brand manager.<\/p>\n Right now, everything he\u2019s saying is getting magnified, and there\u2019s rarely context around it. Take the latest kerfuffle, where Vitello mentioned that there had been \u201ctwo other clubhouse incidents<\/a>\u201d that reporters didn\u2019t get wind of. It appeared to be unnecessarily volunteered information, except consider the context. The first clubhouse incident he\u2019s referring to was Matt Chapman telling Casey Schmitt to catch the f\u2019ing ball<\/a>. That wasn\u2019t much of an incident.<\/p>\n I have worked under (and done a podcast with) an editor who would 100 percent look me in the eyes and say \u201cCatch the f\u2019ing ball,\u201d except he would make it about writing, and he wouldn\u2019t leave out the offending letters. Then he would say them again. And I would take that message in the spirit it was given because I respect this editor and his methods of communication, which range from love-love to tough love. If it came from a different editor, the message might not land. You have to know the dynamics, and the people involved definitely do.<\/p>\n So in that spirit, where the \u201cincident\u201d in question was something relatively banal and ephemeral in a workplace setting, and it shouldn\u2019t be that weird to mention them offhand like Vitello did. If he gets tired of the scrutiny and parsing of every quote, he\u2019ll stop giving them. If he\u2019s truly not reading the chatter and focused on baseball, baseball, baseball, he\u2019ll keep being himself, and the idea is that eventually it will seem charming. He\u2019ll start to get better in the format with experience.<\/p>\n That\u2019s the working theory, at least. But I\u2019m just a writer who gives 110 percent and absolutely loves it when a manager says something I haven\u2019t heard before. If it becomes a problem, it\u2019ll probably stop. Here\u2019s hoping it doesn\u2019t become a problem. It\u2019s too much fun as is.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The San Francisco Giants are playing 1.000 baseball over their last two games, .667 baseball since Monday, .250…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":671801,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2408],"tags":[5,162,4,378,66,4343,4340,4344,4341,4342],"class_list":{"0":"post-671800","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-mlb","11":"tag-san-francisco","12":"tag-san-francisco-giants","13":"tag-sanfrancisco","14":"tag-sanfranciscogiants","15":"tag-sf","16":"tag-sf-giants","17":"tag-sfgiants"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116375976479128219","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/671800","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=671800"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/671800\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/671801"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=671800"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=671800"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=671800"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"SAN](\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2270156546-scaled-e1775548164639.jpg\")
<\/p>\n