Bruce Bochy wanted to break bread.
President of baseball operations Buster Posey consulted Bochy before hiring Tony Vitello, and Bochy threw his support behind the unorthodox hire. Bochy hadn’t met Vitello beforehand despite spending his offseasons in Tennessee but had admired the former Volunteers coach’s work from afar. In late October, before Vitello was officially introduced, the Giants’ manager of the past met with the Giants’ manager of the future.
The conversation began with introductions and pleasantries. Soon enough, they talked ball. Vitello, the student, picked Bochy’s brain about bullpen management, a field where Bochy earned a doctorate.
The chat wasn’t a one-off. Rather, it was the first of many. With Bochy joining the Giants as a special advisor to baseball operations, Vitello will have plenty of opportunities to learn from the future Hall of Famer who brought three World Series titles to San Francisco. Bochy isn’t calling the shots from Oracle Park’s third-base dugout, but he still wants to help win a championship.
“I’ll be another set of eyes and ears for Buster or Tony if he wants to bounce anything off me,” Bochy said in a recent phone interview. “I’m there to help. I’m not going to be in the way. I’ll do whatever I can. I’ll see the club at least monthly and I’ll be in spring training for a little bit. I’m going to take a look at the affiliates and see the minor leaguers. I’m just here to help.”
Posey told reporters in early October after firing Bob Melvin that Bochy would not be considered for the Giants’ managerial vacancy after Bochy parted ways with the Rangers. Still, Posey added that the door would always be open for Bochy to return to the organization in a different role.
Bochy, 70, wasn’t sure what he was going to do following his three seasons as the Rangers’ manager. He considered taking a year off. The Rangers offered him a non-managerial role. Bochy and Posey talked soon after Bochy left Texas, and Posey presented him with an opportunity to return to San Francisco.
“He said, ‘We’d love to have you here,’” recalled Bochy, who served as a special adviser after his first retirement in 2019. “I spent a big part of my career managing there and had so many friends and ex-teammates and players that I had are still there. This just seemed like it made the most sense for me, the right fit right now as I take a step back in my schedule.”
Bochy’s legacy in San Francisco has long been cemented. Over 13 seasons in San Francisco, Bochy led the Giants to three championships in 2010, ‘12 and ‘14. He won the second-most games in franchise history (1,052), overseeing teams that featured icons such as Posey, Tim Lincecum, Madison Bumgarner, Matt Cain and Pablo Sandoval.
Before San Francisco, Bochy won 951 games with the Padres from 1995-2006 and led San Diego to a World Series appearance in 1998. After San Francisco, Bochy won 249 more games with the Rangers from 2023-25, guiding Texas to its first World Series victory in his first season.
Bochy’s 2,252 victories are the sixth-most in major-league history, and he’s one of six managers to win at least four World Series titles. With that résumé, Bochy is a virtual lock for the Hall of Fame in 2027 when his name appears on the Contemporary Baseball Era ballot for non-players in December 2026.
Bochy can only be inducted into Cooperstown if he’s not an active manager. He hasn’t officially called it quits — again — as a manager, but he has likely managed his last game in the majors.
“Right now, I’m in a good place,” Bochy said. “I don’t think you rule anything out. I go back to when I stepped down in 2019. I didn’t think I would manage again. Three years went by and things change. I got back in the dugout for the (World Baseball Classic for France) and I missed it.”
For Vitello, who hasn’t played or coached or managed a single game at the professional level, Bochy will be an invaluable resource. So will Dusty Baker, also a Giants special advisor following a career that will land him in Cooperstown.
“He had to grind it pretty hard to get to where he got to in Tennessee,” Bochy said of Vitello. “He worked hard to get there. You look at the success he’s had. He’s smart, he understands the game and I think he’s going to be great in the clubhouse, too. He’s got a great way about him.
“You have to give Buster credit. He went outside the box on this, but it’s not like he’s come out the woodwork or he’s coming out of the booth or he hasn’t been on the field coaching. He’s been on the field coaching and has been a head coach for a long time.”
Vitello’s appointment hasn’t been met with universal praise. Last week, former manager Joe Maddon went on KNBR and described the move as “insulting,” essentially arguing that Vitello didn’t have adequate experience. Vitello said in October that he disagreed with the notion that he hadn’t paid his dues, and Bochy pointed out that Vitello simply “did it in a different way.”
“It wasn’t an easy way,” Bochy said. “If you look at his journey until he became the head coach at Tennessee, he had to ride the bus. He was an assistant, he was a pitching coach, he wore a lot of different hats to get to where he was. That’s going to translate to professional baseball as far as how you handle your players.”