SCOTTSDALE, AZ — The San Francisco Giants hired Tony Vitello as their new manager this offseason. The Giants believe in Vitello, who will attempt to lead San Francisco to the postseason this year. Vitello is also preparing to enter the historic Los Angeles Dodgers-Giants rivalry, something he addressed during Thursday's Cactus League Spring Training Media Day.
“Anytime you get a heightened sense of competition it’s exciting,” Vitello told ClutchPoints. “I was a big college basketball fan growing up, and still am, you know, Tennessee-Kentucky was electric. Duke-North Carolina is always fun to watch on TV. I still remember, I went to Missouri-KU (Kansas) at KU, where there is true hate, like as much hatred as you can imagine… Those were some of the most memorable games I've cheered for, been at, watched on TV.
“And so to be in the fire and be involved in stuff like that I think is something… It’s easier to call it a blessing at the beginning, or something you're excited about, because if the outcome is not the way you want, it can really be defeating. But if it is, you can almost get too high sometimes.”
Vitello most recently coached the Tennessee baseball program. Competitive college baseball features no shortage of rivalries. While the Dodgers-Giants matchups will be different in MLB, Vitello seems prepared for the rivalry element of it all.
He is even “sniffing” out the big moments.
“But it’s what you want to watch, it’s what you want to cheer for, it's what you want to see,” the new Giants manager continued. “So the only thing better than all that is to be apart of very highly competitive games… Whether it's that set of circumstances or others that arise, you're kind of sniffing that out a little bit as a competitor, of the moments where it's a tie game, you know, the game is going to be decided in the 9th.”
