SF Giants broadcaster gets honest about how Tony Vitello is lacking as manager

It’s been a rough first season for SF Giants manager Tony Vitello. While he wasn’t given the most foolproof roster in the world he’s certainly faced a steep learning curve and Giants broadcaster Dave Flemming recently pointed out how Vitello is lacking in one key area.

Flemming thinks that Vitello needs to be a bit more assertive and should just be himself: “I think he's been so deferential to all of the veterans around him... But the Giants hired him to be him... I want that leadership from him to be a little more obvious." 

It’s a fair point since Vitello has definitely not openly criticized any players on the team even when it may have warranted it. When Matt Chapman cussed at Casey Schmitt in San Diego earlier in the year that was an opportunity to lay down the law and say that kind of stuff won’t be tolerated.

When Willy Adames was playing paddy cake on the bases with Mookie Betts and forgot how many outs there were he could have benched him the next day.

After Rafael Devers openly defied Vitello and shooed away pinch runner Jonah Cox that was another moment where he could have benched a player to send a message but he has not done that.

Of course, one could argue he made the right call in all those instances. He is a rookie manager coming straight from the college ranks so if he starts telling off veterans and antagonizing them it could easily lead to clubhouse strife and could actually backfire.

Vitello should be his true self the rest of the season

Yet, the Giants hired him because he was a high-energy guy at the University of Tennessee who wasn’t afraid to light a fire under his team and who Buster Posey expected to bring about a detail-oriented brand of baseball. That hasn’t happened, but Posey has already made it pretty clear the Giants aren’t going to pull the plug after one year of the Vitello experiment.

Still, Vitello does have to assert himself more and maybe with time he will gain that confidence. We don’t know how the players in the clubhouse feel about him and winning is probably the only way to truly gain their respect but however the team has done things up to this point in 2026 obviously hasn’t worked.

Vitello may be holding back some of his true self or may still feel somewhat out of place in the big leagues but he may as well just let loose and be the guy the Giants hired because at this point things really can’t get that much worse.

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