Tony Vitello's subtle dig at SF Giants roster provides offseason challenge for Posey

The SF Giants introduced Tony Vitello as their next manager at a press conference on Thursday. The conference went fine, but Vitello made one comment about the team's roster that could be interpreted as a minor dig.

When talking about the team's roster, Vitello said it was "pretty good." He surely did not mean it to be disrespectful towards president of baseball operations Buster Posey or general manager Zack Minasian, but it could be interpreted that way.

Vitello's subtle dig at SF Giants roster shows room for improvement

Minasian appeared on KNBR after the press conference and was asked about Vitello's "pretty good" remark. He had the following to say: “Yeah. Well, when Tony says 'pretty good,' look, I've been sitting in the office the last month. We haven't had any games in Oracle Park. So you're not going to hear me be very defensive. The season that we had, quite frankly, it's just not good enough and it needs to be better because we expect to play October baseball.”

It was refreshing to hear Minasian be so honest and forthcoming in his response. He was not defensive at all and said it is fair to say that the roster has room for improvement because the Giants did not make the playoffs for the fourth consecutive season.

In essence, Vitello's "pretty good" comment can serve as a catalyst for both Minasian and Posey to go out and make some moves this offseason to address the roster and maybe even make it "great."

The pitching staff is obviously the biggest area that needs to be addressed. The Giants need to go out and get some starters and they are also going to have a lot of work to do to piece together a bullpen that was arguably the best in baseball in the first half of the 2025 season but by the end of the season was decimated by trades and injuries.

Posey and Minasian will have their work cut out for them to address those key needs.

Overall, the press conference went fairly smoothly. Vitello had some interesting ties to the organization and made sure to pay homage to the rich tradition of the franchise. There are certainly going to be doubters still until he proves that he can win at the big league level, but he made a pretty good first impression.

We will see if his "pretty good" remark spurs any big additions this offseason, but how good a manager is does not really matter if they are managing a roster that does not have the requisite talent to win.