San Francisco Giants manager Tony Vitello spoke with the media on Monday, but started things off with a question of his own.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen did you first think I was taking this job?\u201d the rookie manager asked the gaggle of reporters. \u201cDo you remember that far back?\u201d<\/p>\n
San Francisco Chronicle reporter Susan Slusser was sitting next to Vitello and told him, \u201cIt was about four days before it actually happened. Five days before.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vitello was announced<\/a> as the new manager of the Giants on October 22, 2025, following eight seasons as the head coach of the Tennessee Volunteers. The timing of the reporting around his interest and eventual acceptance of the job still seems to irk him.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah, that\u2019s funny you say that because that was not reality at all,\u201d Vitello said. \u201cI don\u2019t know if Buster (Posey)<\/a> would feel the same way, but that wasn\u2019t the case. Somebody decides they think they got the information. The final blow was about four days later.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m just kind of having a conversation, therapy, if you will, from walking out of there. I needed confirmation from the coaches that I worked with, that helped boost my status, that they were okay with what was gonna go on, and they were going to be okay with their jobs. That staff had always been built as next man up, and all of a sudden that was being threatened. So it was kind of hard to do something for yourself, and your teammates get left behind.<\/p>\n \u201cBut yeah, it was not four days, for what it\u2019s worth. That was not the case at all. If you would\u2019ve seen me in my condo, you would\u2019ve, you would\u2019ve agreed.\u201d<\/p>\n It was certainly an odd way to kick off his press conference, and Vitello, who is prone to speaking (and spitting) freely<\/a>, was asked why he felt like he needed to clarify that now.<\/p>\n \u201cBecause somebody tweeted it out,\u201d Vitello said. \u201cI don\u2019t know who told them. I wish I did. And it might have changed the course of history if I would\u2019ve known who did, to be honest with you. But it just bothers me because, I don\u2019t know, you see people angry on the \u2014 I hate to get philosophical \u2014 but you see people angry on the streets for, a lot of times, stuff that\u2019s not even true, you know? People arguing, and you don\u2019t know what reality is.\u201d<\/p>\n As he continued, it sounded like Vitello really wanted to make it clear that he had not put that information out there and did not want it out until he could let his current staff and players know the situation. And when that didn\u2019t happen, it left him in an uncomfortable position, having to tell everyone after the fact.<\/p>\n \u201cI did a really damn good job at keeping that away from our team, our recruiting, and it was not a distraction,\u201d Vitello said. \u201cAnd then all of a sudden, in the middle of practice, I see our first and third base coach freaking out, and they freaked out on me, too. And for no reason, because at that point, nothing was going to happen.<\/p>\n \u201cBut somebody decided that it was going to happen, and then the whole world started spinning real, real quick. And I had to address the team.\u201d<\/p>\n Perhaps most importantly, Vitello wanted to make clear that his potential departure was not a distraction for his players.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople said either that or me leaving was a distraction,\u201d he said. \u201cThose guys are SEC athletes. They ain\u2019t distracted by me. We dealt with years where they thought we might take a job, or we were offered a job, or there was jobs open. I\u2019d meet with guys in the office, they\u2019re like: \u2018Coach, we don\u2019t care.\u2019 The guys care about the guys when the season\u2019s going on, and hopefully they love their coaches, but that thing was never a distraction. They got talent, and they got good kids, so they\u2019re going to be just fine.<\/p>\n \u201cYeah, that was not a fun Saturday, and then it kind of affected how the next few days went. But ultimately, sorry to rain on your parade,\u201d he said, while nodding towards Slusser. \u201cGreat organization, great people to work with and a great challenge, so [I] didn\u2019t say no.\u201d<\/p>\n Months later, Giants manager Tony Vitello laments premature reports about his hiring in an impromptu \u201ctangent\u201d to start the morning media session: https:\/\/t.co\/JJn9jRmdkY<\/a> via @sfchronicle<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Susan Slusser (@susanslusser) February 16, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n While Vitello might feel like he needed to get all of that off his chest, there were probably better ways to go about it. It feels like the kind of thing he might have saved for a profile piece or in a sit-down interview. The longer this went on, the more it started to feel like a \u201cSir, this is a Wendy\u2019s<\/a>\u201d scenario.<\/p>\n In this context, in front of so many media members and with the situation far behind him, there was a \u201cthe manager doth protest too much\u201d quality to it that is likely to create conversations and thoughts that weren\u2019t there before. He also seemed to be not so subtly pushing back directly on Slusser, which doesn\u2019t seem like the best of ideas when you\u2019re new in town, given her sizable impact and reputation in the industry.<\/p>\n \t