Skyline College baseball hitting coach Anthony Granato was watching from thousands of miles away when Team Italy, which he used to play for, punched its ticket to the World Baseball Classic semifinals.
Then, just a few weeks later, he saw another of his former teams pull off a shock upset, when No. 11-seed Virginia Commonwealth University defeated the No. 6 seed University of North Carolina 82-78 in the first round of the NCAA Division I men’s basketball tournament.
Two upsets, two sports, two continents — and one common denominator: Granato.
The 1999 graduate of Burlingame High School played baseball for both Team Italy and VCU during his career, starting with VCU on an athletic scholarship from 2003-04, after capturing a state batting championship at Skyline in 2002. While VCU basketball might have the spotlight now, it was all about baseball when Granato was playing. In his junior season, the team racked up a 46-13 record, making it to the NCAA Super Regionals, where they fell short against North Carolina State. Granato played a big role in the Rams’ stellar season, hitting a .280 batting average and stealing 22 bases.
“We were really good,” Granato said. “We won our conference that year. We were ranked 11th in the nation. We had a great season. … It was an awesome experience.”
Granato’s two seasons at VCU were good enough to get him a shot at professional baseball, as the Chicago Cubs signed him up as an undrafted free agent in 2004.
Granato bounced around the minor leagues, playing for the Cubs and the Colorado Rockies, and then playing in independent leagues across the US and Europe from 2007-09.
“It was cool to play in the minor leagues and just meet people from all of these different walks of life and different countries,” Granato said. “It was a lot of really, really talented players, good baseball, and a lot of long bus rides.”
Granato got the call up to play for Team Italy in the 2013 WBC. Now, 13 years later, Granato watched as his national team made an improbable run of upsets, all the way to the WBC semifinals.
“Me and five or six of my teammates from the 2013 team were in a group chat with our old manager, who is now the president of Italy Baseball,” Granato said. “We were all cheering them on, continuing to support them.”
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Italy didn’t find the same success in 2013, falling in the second round. However, Granato said the experience was one of the highlights of his playing career.
“That was my big leagues,” Granato said. “I got to be on a team with a bunch of big leaguers and compete against big leaguers for a couple of weeks. I did really well, played well. We did well as a team. So, it was a great experience overall.”
Now, Granato has moved from the field to the dugout, taking on the hitting coach role at Skyline after a seven-year stint as the head coach at Sacred Heart Prep. At Skyline, Granato has helped lead the team to enormous success, making the playoffs every year since he began coaching in 2021, including two trips to the California Community College Athletic Association Super Regionals.
“What we wanted to do was take [Skyline] to the next level and really just continue the winning tradition, getting players moved on, and bringing quality attention to the program,“ Granato said.
This year, Skyline is off to a hot start with a 20-6 record and appears to be comfortably in playoff position.
“We got a big week coming up this week against CSM, and we got an opportunity to handle business there and get right back into being in first place,” Granato said. “Then, we go for our fourth conference title in five years.”
In addition to coaching at Skyline, Granato also founded his own development organization, GamePrep Baseball Academy, where he hosts camps and programs for youth baseball players. The program has produced multiple players who’ve moved on to the next level, including eighth-round MLB draft pick Drew Dowd.
“I put so much time and effort into my life and into the game,” Granato said. “I just thought it was an opportunity to take all the knowledge and experience that I gained over the years and give it back and try to be a mentor and help players that were like me growing up.”
Granato has witnessed plenty of upsets, and through coaching, he now has the chance to witness plenty more.
“It’s just life changing,” Granato said. “I just hope that more players get the opportunities to experience what I did, and hopefully it shapes their lives in positive ways. I’m super grateful for everything the game has given me.”
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