It’s hard to imagine how new San Francisco Giants manager Tony Vitello’s first series in the major leagues could have gone worse, for reasons both on and off the field.
The Giants sure seemed to wilt under that spotlight, getting swept by the Yankees in their three-game series with an unbelievably bad showing on offense. The Giants scored all of one run across the 27 innings, setting several records for futility in the process. The most notable was the Giants were shut out in back-to-back games to open the season for the first time in the franchise’s 144-year history. And in the recorded history of the franchise, the one run and 12 hits combined across three games are also record lows.
Of course, it’s fair to say that you can’t blame a manager for a bad weekend of offense, particularly from a veteran-heavy team. But Vitello only made things worse with a series of questionable comments during the weekend, both in postgame press conferences and in-game interviews.
After Friday’s loss and second shutout in a row, Vitello went into the postgame press conference and tried to blame himself for the poor showings, claiming a fiery speech he gave earlier in the week may have led guys to play with too much “fire and brimstone” on the field. Giants players like Robbie Ray and Heliot Ramos talked right after Vitello and effectively disputed the manager’s notion, saying two losses in a row happen often in the majors during 162-game seasons.
Then during Saturday’s game, Vitello did an in-game interview with Fox’s Ken Rosenthal, who asked Vitello about the biggest adjustment so far since getting to the majors. Vitello gave a wry smile and chuckled in his response.
“I can’t talk down to guys anymore, they’re my age — or it feels like they’re close to it,” Vitello said. “But in all honesty, I think there are just so many more people involved. There are so many more people in the stands, there are more people in the clubhouse. It truly is a manager position, not just a head coach position. But the thing I like doing more than recruiting or managing is coaching, so just trying to fill in spots when I can and just help these guys out.”
It’s an eyebrow-raising comment from Vitello for a few reasons. At 47, he’s several years older than even the oldest active player in MLB (ex-Giants pitcher Justin Verlander) and is 13 years older than the oldest Giant in Ray, who is 34. Most of the roster are in their late 20s and early 30s — which undoubtedly makes them more mature than college kids, sure. But even joking about how he “can’t talk down to guys anymore” will rile up the people doubting he can handle the big leagues in the first place.
Among the many questions about Vitello’s move to the majors, two of the biggest were about how he would connect with players who are making more money than the manager and how he’d handle all the things that come with being a big-league manager that aren’t on the field. In just one weekend, he’s given the doubters plenty of fodder on both of those topics. (And that doesn’t even touch on any in-game managing, either.)
Of course, it’s only three games in a long season, and you never want to overreact to a bad weekend of baseball on the field. But more than the poor play, Vitello’s own words are only going to throw more gas on the doubters’ fire — and further increase the spotlight on the new guy and his team.