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00:00I don't get this at all. 408, Willard Hector is not paid to be the manager.
00:05Vitello is rightfully on the hot seat. Stop deflecting.
00:09A, not deflecting. B, no, he's not on the hot seat.
00:13And C, why on earth would you, and again, I'm not even going to say defend the person,
00:21why would you defend the outcomes that are happening at third base?
00:25Yes. Nobody blames Tony Vitello for Hector Borg's wheeling left arm, right?
00:36If they have a philosophy of, we're going to be aggressive,
00:40and yesterday they were more aggressive on the bases than they have been.
00:43First time all year, they stole multiple bases in a single game,
00:47so I don't know if they are specifically trying to be more aggressive on the bases.
00:53But aggression and stupidity are too very, that doesn't mean just go no matter what.
00:57I agree with you, but it might be something that they've talked about
01:00and something that they actually want to do,
01:02and so Hector Borg is over there thinking, we want to be aggressive,
01:05and I'll show you aggressive.
01:07Yeah, but you know what's funny to me?
01:09Like people, and some people do this at different levels,
01:12you'll say that the manager is accountable for the product, right?
01:16Yep.
01:16Okay, so then when something is happening out on the field that is clearly subpar with the product,
01:25don't you want the manager to do something?
01:28If you're holding Tony Vitello responsible for what's happening on the field,
01:34then I would say, great, let's give him the responsibility.
01:39And please reassign Hector Borg, especially now that I know,
01:45based on hearing your words earlier today, you kind of sound like you want to.
01:50Now that's me, that's me putting my judgment into it.
01:54But he kind of sounded like he wanted to.
01:56Don't you think?
01:57Didn't those words sound like that to you?
01:59Somewhat, yeah.
01:59I mean, all the things he said have been about, you know, base running and Adamas,
02:04and he hasn't really called him out, nor does he have to, nor will he, I don't think.
02:08But he can make the move now.
02:10He can give him a few more shots to try to right the ship,
02:14or, you know, he can do things how he wants to do it.
02:17Organizationally, they might make the call,
02:19and we're going to find out tomorrow who's out there in the third base coach's box.
02:23But there's a certain amount of, like, value and loyalty if you're Tony Vitello.
02:28And if you think that, you know, things have been bad,
02:31but if you think that it can be saved or you want to show that you can be loyal to
02:36a guy
02:36who is equally new at his job as you are,
02:39there's a thought that you might give him a few more chances.
02:43Okay.
02:44Does this change your thought on it at all?
02:48And by the way, I know that I'm, right, we're zeroing in on this one thing.
02:53Obviously, the Giants, if you just go, okay, write down all their problems.
02:57It's like, well, I'll see you tomorrow.
02:59Like, it's going to take me a while to write all of that down.
03:02But this is the one that's just at the top of my mind today,
03:05and I think that that's fair after what we saw yesterday.
03:09Tony was also asked today about the decision to make Borg the third base coach in the first place.
03:17Try this on for size.
03:18Yep.
03:19Listen to this answer.
03:22During the meetings we had at Oracle Park,
03:24his name came up as a guy down in the organization who some would truly be disappointed
03:31if for some reason he bounced to another organization.
03:36There are guys who switch for various reasons,
03:39and sometimes if they're even moving for a lateral position,
03:43if there's permission, you can lose a guy.
03:46So that was kind of the origin of it.
03:48The first time I was able to meet him in person was spring training.
03:53Okay.
03:54He completely just washed his hands of that decision.
03:58And this is what I am feeling today.
04:02I said yesterday that it does not feel like the right hand and the left hand are working together.
04:07I went to bed.
04:08I woke up.
04:09I feel it even more today.
04:10Zach Manazian is with Jim Bowden saying the lineup is Tony's call.
04:17Now here we got the third base coach.
04:19Tony's like, well, that was the organization's call.
04:21Organization didn't want to lose him, so they brought him to me in spring training.
04:26I met him and said, sure.
04:28I just, it does not feel like you've got a group that's working together here.
04:34And that, to me, is a very big core piece of why we're watching what we're watching on the baseball
04:43field.
04:44This is starting to feel very much like the Golden State Warrior team after Jordan Poole got punched.
04:50Which is like, okay, you're able to do some things, but remember that team couldn't win a road game?
04:56Couldn't win a road game, yeah.
04:57And everyone's like, why can't you win a road game?
04:58Well, we found out later that something was rotten to the core from the inside out.
05:03Yep.
05:03I don't know.
05:05I have less, like, that was easy to figure out what it was that was rotten to the core.
05:08This one's much more complex, but we should not have this many quotes that are sort of like,
05:15ah, yeah, go talk to that guy over there.
05:17I don't know why, like, I don't know why Hector Borg's the third base coach.
05:21Well, here's a quote from February.
05:23I don't know who's making the lineup.
05:23I talked about this yesterday, the Pavlovich article, NBC Sports Bay Area, and Manassian's quoted,
05:28and he says, quote, I can remember getting off the Zoom, and I don't even know if it was five
05:32seconds,
05:33and Tony was like, can we hire that guy?
05:35So that's Manassian saying that Tony really wanted to hire that guy after the Zoom call,
05:40and then Tony says yesterday, didn't meet him until spring training,
05:43and the whole idea of, like, what's the flow of the things that are happening.
05:48So Tony gets hired, and it's not, all right, Tony, go out there and hire your staff.
05:53If it's, all right, Tony, you're hired, and here's what we think about a third base coach,
05:57and there will be a Zoom tomorrow, and you'll get a chance to meet him on Zoom.
06:00By the way, I don't even have any issue with any of this, but I have issue with it now.
06:05Like, it's not working.
06:07I don't know why this is, like, this doesn't, am I wrong?
06:11This doesn't feel difficult to me.
06:14This doesn't feel mean.
06:16It doesn't feel difficult, right?
06:18Like, somebody just texted in, like, a guy just lost his grandma, you jerk.
06:22Yes, he just lost his grandma.
06:25I don't actually know what the hell that has to do with coaching third base.
06:29You know what I mean?
06:31Like, sorry.
06:33You know?
06:34Like, I just, I don't know why, that can't be relevant here.
06:38This is a $240 million payroll and a multi-billion dollar industry.
06:45And you have got to have the respect of your fans.
06:49You have to have the respect of your players.
06:50Did it look to you like Willie Adamas yesterday in the clubhouse?
06:54Did he respect the decision that Hector Borg made?
06:56I don't think he was thrilled with it, no.
06:57And if you go back to this article, Borg is quoted, and he says,
07:01I'm an aggressive third base coach.
07:02I've always been that way.
07:04It's fine.
07:04Vitello says, I think you'd rather err on the side of aggressive and then pull back.
07:09So maybe it's as easy as, all right, let's pull back before we remove Hector Borg,
07:14because, yeah, it's only been 56 games.
07:18But this is not the first egregious error.
07:21When he made an error where he wasn't as aggressive.
07:24So.
07:25He's just flat out doing the wrong things over and over again.
07:30I don't know any other way to say this.
07:34We're all sitting here super bummed about the way the Giants are playing baseball,
07:39but y'all want to make no changes?
07:40That doesn't make any sense to me.
07:43I want to make changes, but I don't know if this change is going to be the really significant one
07:49that leads to more winning.
07:50I'll buy that.
07:51But for me, it's not even about that.
07:53It's just the right thing to do.
07:55It's the right thing to do.
07:56I don't know if it's the right thing to do or not.
07:58I believe very firmly it's the right thing to do.
08:00I believe there are those in the organization who believe it's the right thing to do.
08:04You know, like, there's different cultures that get built in businesses.
08:08To a degree, ours is similar.
08:11It's not the exact same.
08:13But you know this.
08:14Like, people are not surprised in our business if you have a lack of performance that spans over a significant
08:23period of time,
08:24and that lack of performance is kind of pronounced.
08:27Like, it doesn't surprise you when you get called in.
08:31It just depends on how long you're given and how bad you are.
08:34Right.
08:35Like, this is professional sports.
08:38It's if you had a guy shooting threes for the Warriors and he missed 40 in a row, you all
08:44would ask him to stop shooting threes.
08:49It's very A to B to me.
08:52And, like, I get that not everybody's going to see that the same way, but this is a pronounced and
08:58prolonged period of poor decision making.
09:02I mean, two months is prolonged?
09:05Yes.
09:05I don't think so.
09:06Yes.
09:06I really don't see it that way.
09:08I have never watched a baseball season in my life where there have been this many directed third-base coach
09:15egregious errors.
09:16Well, he hasn't had that many opportunities because you have the lowest on-base average in the history of the
09:21San Francisco Giants.
09:22And so, and it's obviously exacerbated by the fact that you don't hit, you don't field, you don't win games.
09:29And because of that, we look at these errors and you're 12 games below,
09:32and we look at a guy who clearly is making mistakes as a third-base coach, and it's worse because
09:37you're one of the worst teams in baseball.
09:39There's no question about that.
09:40But I guess, like, let me peel that onion a little bit.
09:43I'm not, this isn't about blaming Hector for how bad the Giants are.
09:48It could be reason number 66.
09:50It doesn't mean that it doesn't need to be addressed.
09:52And it's an easy one to address.
09:54And his errors are consistent and egregious.
09:59They really are.
10:01I mean, we highlight his errors, but we don't highlight when he makes a great call or the right call
10:05because it doesn't stand out.
10:06There haven't been that many of them.
10:07I'd have to go back through all 56 games or whatever.
10:10It's impossible to know.
10:11Yeah, it's impossible to know.
10:12We see the mistakes because they're obvious and they're mistakes.
10:15Yeah, but then again, like, okay, let's do that with an offensive lineman.
10:20We don't sit here and go, okay, now go back through all of the snaps where he didn't give up
10:25a sack.
10:26If you're making too many errors, you're making too many egregious errors.
10:31And I find these to be egregious.
10:33There are different kinds of errors.
10:34I know some of you can rightfully bring up, hey, Willie Adamas is leading the world in errors.
10:39I don't find his errors as egregious.
10:41I can only think of, in fact, one that I find to be an egregious mental error, which is when
10:47he forgot how many outs there were.
10:48Yeah, I mean, errors are errors.
10:50And when you're a shortstop, your job is to make plays.
10:52Absolutely.
10:53And he's got 10 errors.
10:54And those can all be accountable, but let's also not act like we're all coming from the same starting block.
10:59One of you makes $182 million over the next six years.
11:02The other one is 40 years old and just got put there for the first time in his life as
11:07third base coach.
11:08He's been a third base coach before.
11:09Not in the bigs.
11:10And your manager hasn't been a manager in the bigs either.
11:13Correct.
11:13So, like, discussion is open for everything.
11:17But not Tony Vitello.
11:18Well, no, of course it's open for Tony Vitello, but I'm not ready to start talking about a firing.
11:24That's a little bit less of an A to B job.
11:26Right.
11:26The manager thing is not.
11:28I don't get that direct result to what you're doing as often.
11:33And, by the way, I would argue that a lot of what we've seen on the field is sort of
11:38in spite of Tony.
11:39But you're allowed to disagree with that.
11:41I just think you're an organization right now that, from the inside out, everybody is really edgy right now.
11:48And everybody is sort of struggling to find trust in one another.
11:54And this is one of those key subject matters.
11:59No, Hector Borg is not the biggest problem on the Giants.
12:02But he's representative right now of the biggest problem on the Giants.
12:06It feels very Bush League.
12:09And I don't think.
12:11Across the board.
12:11Well, you could argue that.
12:14You've got your third baseman barking at your first baseman to catch the bleeping ball.
12:18I don't think that's Bush League.
12:19I think that happens in every major league clubhouse.
12:21I'm just going to lay out the things that I think are Bush League.
12:24And that would be one of them.
12:26You've got no closer.
12:27And so you try a guy.
12:29And he's not it.
12:30So he gets optioned a triple A.
12:31That's fine.
12:32And you still don't have a closer.
12:33You bring in two journeymen to be the back end of your rotation.
12:37And Hauser's getting better.
12:39But Malley's the worst pitcher in baseball.
12:40That's kind of a Bush League offseason, if you ask me.
12:43You've got guys pelvic thrusting each other after victories.
12:47Ask your boy, Will Clark, how he feels about those shenanigans.
12:51You're a losing team.
12:53You're pelvic thrusting each other.
12:55You're yelling at each other.
12:56You don't know how many outs there are.
12:58Your closer gets optioned.
13:00And now we're going to whack the third base coach because he's having a bad start.
13:03Yes.
13:03Well, that's that's just another thing that's Bush League.
13:06But I don't say I don't like while I think you have some points in there.
13:10Those things are not all equal.
13:12And they're not all coming from the same starting block.
13:14No, but the same manager is the guy who is presiding over all of it.
13:18No doubt.
13:18No doubt.
13:19And I think that like a learning curve at that position was predictable.
13:23But at the same time, that's a different position.
13:27And those errors are less egregious to me.
13:31I mean, the hip thrusting, that's sort of like, that's not even on the field.
13:36Tyler Malley's sucking, that is on the field.
13:40There's physical mistakes.
13:41There's mental mistakes.
13:43And by the way, I already said on the crossover, I'd make a move on him too.
13:47Like if I, if I got what I'm hoping for, for Tony Vitello tomorrow at about 3.30 when he
13:56meets the media in the dugout,
13:58I hope he is asked about the starting rotation beyond the Rocky series.
14:02And I hope he is empowered to say Trevor McDonald will be making his start.
14:07Tyler Malley will not.
14:08We'll see where that goes.
14:10He's either going to the bullpen.
14:12We're figuring that out.
14:13And, and Ron Wotus is coaching third tonight.
14:17Those are, I'm not saying they're the only moves.
14:19Those are the first two.
14:20I mean, tonight, you mean like going forward.
14:22No, tomorrow night, yes.
14:23I mean, you're not just going to have the guy sit, like, you're going to sit for a game.
14:26Who?
14:27Like, you're not going to have Hector Borg just sit out a game.
14:30No, no.
14:30You're going to make the move and he's going to get sent wherever he gets sent.
14:33Hopefully, for his sake, it's no longer with the Major League Club because that's kind of embarrassing when you get
14:38demoted.
14:38And now you're going to be the assistant to the assistant general manager on the bench.
14:42I don't think it's any more embarrassing than what happened on the field yesterday.
14:46I really don't.
14:47Well, that's embarrassing, but that's, that's a guy making a mistake.
14:49And, you know, we can, we can forgive Willie Adamas' mistakes because he's making 180 million.
14:55That's life.
14:55And yeah, the third base coach is making mistakes.
14:58That's life.
14:58And by the way, they're worse mistakes.
15:00Like, I can't even describe to everybody in the big leagues what that is like when you are down by
15:08a run in the eighth inning and you're sending someone who hasn't arrived at third base yet while the ball
15:15is already traveling to the infield with your best hitter on deck.
15:19That, that, like, honestly, I know people are going to get super mad at this.
15:23That's way worse than forgetting how many outs there are.
15:26Forgetting how many outs there are is an inexcusable mental error.
15:29But it happens.
15:30I've never seen what I saw yesterday.
15:34You don't, like, that's the craziest bad send I think I've ever seen in my life watching baseball.
15:39It was the easiest, no doubter, stay right here moment that you could possibly imagine.
15:47And he didn't even blink.
15:49He did the opposite.
15:50He made the call in real time and he told you back in February he's aggressive.
15:54And that was aggressive.
15:56That was overly aggressive.
15:57And so, yeah, you've got a situation where if Tony V's unhappy, he probably doesn't have the authority to just
16:03straight up make the move.
16:05You've got to get on the phone and ask the bosses because they love him.
16:08He's in the organization, Hector Borg.
16:10And so you can't just, like, sit the guy down and say, you're not coaching third anymore.
16:14And that is part of the problem.
16:16Tony Vitello's got to run a lot of this up the flagpole and, you know, get permission to do things.
16:22I agree with you, but don't you feel like that's kind of how it is now?
16:26I don't, do you, like, are there any managers in baseball that can just unilaterally do that without even, like,
16:32no conversation with baseball ops, with GMs?
16:36With a third base coach?
16:37Sure.
16:38Like, or anything like that.
16:39Do you know what I mean?
16:40I mean, it's like Tony Vitello can't be like, we're sending Will Brennan down.
16:45Well, he's probably getting sent, but you're right.
16:47I mean, he might, right?
16:48But you can't, you can't do that.
16:49We can't send Tyler Malley to the bullpen.
16:51You've got to talk to people.
16:53Right.
16:53So I don't, I don't necessarily have a problem with that.
16:55What I have a problem with is if Tony were to, in an impassioned way, right now, as we speak,
17:02it's 350 in Colorado.
17:04And he's in Buster's hotel room, and he's begging him, I gotta have a new third base coach tomorrow.
17:10And Buster says, no.
17:12Then I'd have an issue.
17:13Then I'd have an issue.
17:15Because Tony is absolutely, he needs that power.
17:18And he would be in the right.
17:19Yeah, I mean, he would be in the right, but the guy's only two months on the job.
17:24So for me, if you're going to talk about getting rid of a third base coach after two months, and
17:28he is struggling,
17:30then the manager is not necessarily going to be safe at the end of the year.
17:33And I'm just looking at the Calci markets.
17:35You know, I love to check it.
17:36And gone by December 1st, Tony Vitello, 17% chance.
17:42So just something to keep an eye on.
17:44Yeah, like that's very, very low.
17:45It's not very, very low.
17:47Like Dave Roberts is at six.
17:49There are, there's a bunch of guys below him.
17:51He's right in the middle.
17:53Carlos Mendoza of the Mets, 96% chance.
17:56He's gone before December 1.
17:58You got Hinch and Dan Wilson in Seattle.
18:02These guys are above 50%.
18:03And yeah, 17%, Tony Vitello.
18:06I don't disagree with what you're saying if the world was all fair, but it's not.
18:10Tony's the manager.
18:11Hector Borg's just the third base coach.
18:12That's different.
18:13It's different, but at the same time,
18:15he's also new to the gig.
18:17And you could say he cost him the game yesterday.
18:20We don't know that.
18:21No, I don't know that he cost him the game.
18:22You might have back-to-back strikeouts and you still lose.
18:23I'm taking it solely on the surface of what I saw yesterday
18:28and have seen at least five to seven other times this year.
18:31I'll give you five.
18:32Yeah.
18:32Probably five either bad stops or bad sense.
18:35Just, I mean, again,
18:36like have you ever talked about a third base coach this much in your life?
18:39Matt Williams.
18:39Really?
18:40I mean, was it last year or the year before?
18:42Yeah, there was a discussion.
18:43It was never this, I'd have to look up how many he had,
18:45but he had a, it was a year where it was like,
18:48it might've been the last year where it's like, oh my God.
18:50It didn't feel this intense though.
18:51I don't think.
18:52It's this intense because this guy is brand new.
18:55We don't know who he is.
18:56Matt Williams gets a certain amount of legendary benefit of the doubt,
18:59as did Pat Burrell last year, hitting coach.
19:02We talked a lot about,
19:04hey, I got to get rid of the hitting coach.
19:06Well, I mean the hitting coach,
19:07he's not the one out there swinging and missing a fastball.
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