Giants Tony Vitello isnt only ex-college coach learning ropes in MLB: Its the same game

SEATTLE — When Tony Vitello walked out to home plate this weekend inside T-Mobile Park to exchange lineup cards, he wasn’t the only participant who was a college coach this time last year.The first-year Giants manager had some company in the Mariners’ first-year field coordinator.“I’ve admired him for years,” said Jake McKinley, the former University of Nevada coach who began charting his path to the big leagues in the Bay Area, first as a player at Bethany College in Santa Cruz, then as a coach at West Valley College in Saratoga and later Menlo College.McKinley, who grew up outside Sacramento going to games at Oracle Park, nearly worked for a different Giants manager.He was working on the player development side of the Brewers’ front office when the Giants requested permission to interview him for a position on Gabe Kapler’s staff.

Milwaukee said no, putting him on a parallel path to San Francisco’s current skipper.“I was just like, Tony, man, I want to chat with you.Because we both made the same jump.

I know he jumped into the manager role, but to go from college baseball to the big leagues — that’s a huge jump, and I just want to hear his perspective on it.”The two had never previously crossed paths, outside of the occasional recruiting battle that Vitello’s Vols usually won.Quentin Eberhardt, one of two coaches on Vitello’s staff at Tennessee to follow him to San Francisco, was a mutual connection. Home plate wasn’t the most conducive setting for a conversation.

But Vitello appreciated seeing another product of the college game’s infiltration at the highest level.“I think the umpires were not annoyed that we were going on and on, and it was time to get going with the game,” Vitello joked.“But we were talking college stuff.”McKinley, 41, was named to manager Dan Wilson’s staff about a month after Vitello, 47, made the unprecedented leap to leave Knoxville for the managerial post in San Francisco.It didn’t influen...