On Wednesday, IU officially announced new baseball Coach Jeff Mercer's staff after days of reported hirings.
The first new member of the staff, as reported by Kendall Rogers over the weekend, is former Central Florida and Wright State Coach Justin Parker. Parker helped develop UCF’s pitching staff into one of the best in the nation and will take over as IU’s pitching coach.
The second coach to join the staff was Dan Held, also reported by Rogers earlier this week. The former minor leaguer joins IU after serving as the executive director of the Indiana Bulls, one of the more prestigious travel baseball programs in the state, for more than a decade. Held also brings professional coaching experience to Bloomington, as he served as an assistant bullpen coach with the St. Louis Cardinals prior to his time with the Indiana Bulls.
The third member of the new staff announced by IU is volunteer assistant coach Casey Dykes.
Dykes played under Mercer at Western Kentucky, before joining the Hilltopper coaching staff, coaching with Mercer for a year. After his time at Western Kentucky, Dykes joined the staff at the Virginia Military Institute as the recruiting coordinator. In his time with VMI, he also worked with the catchers and hitters.
In Dykes’ first season with the Keydets, catcher Matt Winn was a finalist for the Johnny Bench Award, an award given annually to the best catcher in division one collegiate baseball. The coach also saw 14 players earn all-conference honors, five MLB draft picks and two of the three All-Americans in VMI baseball history.
