Tennessee’s Tony Vitello Named D1Baseball Coach of the Year • D1Baseball

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Joe Healy – July 23, 2024

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With Tennessee winning its first national championship in 2024, Tony Vitello was the obvious choice to be named D1Baseball’s coach of the year. But all the smaller things that got his team to that point are just as impressive and important in the grand scheme of things.

First of all, his players consistently and vocally champion him, and as a result, you’ve never had to worry about his teams playing hard for him. Whatever the public perception of Vitello has been during his time with the Volunteers, one thing hasn’t changed: the way his players feel about him, and they’re happy to say so publicly.

That was evident again this week at the MLB Draft, where Christian Moore was selected eighth overall by the Angels and, after the pick, joined his head coach on the MLB Network desk (where Vitello was doing on-air analytics work) and said that Vitello “had a vision for me that I never thought I could accomplish.”

Moore’s selection is indicative of the cornerstone of the Vitello-led Volunteers, which is recruiting really, really talented players. Vitello just wrapped up his seventh season at the helm, and as of this writing, including the nine players drafted or signed as undrafted free agents this week, 40 of his former players are in affiliated professional baseball.

It also shouldn’t go unnoticed that Tennessee had a winner at the draft in highly touted recruits in right-hander Tegan Kuhns, who was considered a Day One prospect, and infielder Arnold Abernathy removed their names from the draft after Day Two of the process. Keeping players like that waiting for pro baseball is how elite programs stay at that level.

But at the same time, player development is just as important a piece of the puzzle. Vitello and his staff recruit superstars, sure, but they also have a track record of developing them.

Trey Lipscomb, now in the big leagues with the Nationals, is the ultimate example. For his first three seasons in Knoxville, it might be an understatement to describe him as a role player, as he only batted 76 times during that time. But he became a star as a senior, was drafted in the third round, and is now a big-league player two years later.

Kavares Tears, a fourth-round pick of the Padres this week, could follow a similar path. Before breaking out during the 2024 campaign, he took a redshirt year in 2023 and had 56 plate appearances in 2023.

A big part of that developmental success, of course, is the assistant coaches, and Vitello deserves a lot of credit for hitting it out of the park with his first staff, as pitching coach Frank Anderson and Josh Elander, whose current title is associate head coach and recruiting coordinator, have been with him since he arrived on Rocky Top. And third assistant coach Richard Jackson has been with the group since the fall of 2019, working his way up from student assistant to volunteer assistant to full-time assistant over the years.

That’s a very rare level of personnel continuity, especially in today’s college baseball.

You also can’t overlook everything Vitello’s success has done for the Tennessee campus community. His charisma and personality, along with all the winning, have fueled the Tennessee baseball fan base immensely.

Over the past seven years, Lindsey Nelson Stadium has been transformed into one of the most home-field advantage stadiums in sports. And now, this offseason, it is undergoing a massive, much-needed renovation that will make it one of the best in the country.

When Tennessee won the national title in Omaha, it became immediately clear why Vitello is such a beloved yet polarizing figure in college baseball.

He hugged his family, an emotional moment considering the huge role family has played in getting Vitello to this point in his career. He jumped into the stands to celebrate with the Tennessee fans, doing a baseball version of the Lambeau Leap. During his postgame interview on the field, he yelled, “Holy S***” when he saw he was on the giant video board in right field.

And it’s all thanks to Tony Vitello, being Tony Vitello, a person who has never deviated from who he is, and now he’s the D1Baseball coach of the year.