Mizzou baseball will enter the 2024 season with a familiar face as its new head coach in the dugout. Kerrick Jackson is making his return to Mizzou after having worked as a Tiger assistant coach from 2011-2015. The Tigers made the head coaching change after a 30-24 season in which they went 10-20 in SEC play. Mizzou has not made the NCAA tournament since 2012. Jackson was hired to change that.
Since 2015, Jackson has been the head coach at two other programs: Southern University in Baton Rouge and Memphis. At Southern, Jackson turned the program around from 9-33 in his first season to 32-24 and conference champions in his second. Prior to accepting the head coaching job at Memphis in 2023, Jackson was the President of the MLB Draft League from 2020-2022. In his one year at Memphis the team went 29-28, its first winning season since 2017.
Jackson was announced to be the team's next head coach just a week after Steve Bieser was let go. The decision to return to the University of Missouri for Jackson was an easy one, he said.
“This was the ultimate destination from a head coaching perspective and even an assistant coaching perspective if I couldn't have gotten the head job. But being fortunate and blessed enough to have the opportunity, I couldn't ask to be in a better situation,” Jackson said. “I knew what the place was capable of. I knew what it meant to a lot of different people. I had relationships and still have relationships with a lot of the alums that I did not even coach but guys that because I was around the program prior to that. I just knew this was a really, really special place.
"To come and be in a place where you've always looked up to, I couldn't ask to be in a better spot.”
One of the challenges many new coaches face entering the first season is getting to know the personnel. For Jackson, this is the area where he feels he actually has the advantage with making his return. The first six months of being head coach for Jackson have been a battle at times as well though.
“It's been a whirlwind but I'm finally at a point now where I'm getting my feet on the ground," he said. "I'm getting settled into routines, going through the fall getting to know our personnel, obviously from a playing standpoint. The one advantage I have, of everybody that's on our staff I had a previous relationship with so I didn't have to get to know them as people. I knew them as people already, knew what they were about and how they go about their business. It was a really good time for us all to get our feet on the ground, establish some norms with our kids, get the culture moving in the right direction and get us prepared for the spring.”
Jackson put the finishing touches on his 2024 coaching staff in August, adding five new coaches to his staff including former Mizzou head coach Tim Jamieson as the new pitching coach. Jamieson is the program's second winningest coach all-time and was Jackson's boss in his first stint in Columbia.
When it comes to getting to know the players, Jackson said it's a process he enjoys. He has had multiple players over to his house for meals in an attempt to build the bond between player and coach.
“'m an open book. I'm a straight shooter, I tell it like it is," he said. "I have to be concerned, care and love them for the people that they are and not the baseball players that they are because the baseball piece is gonna go away someday. Being able to build those relationships throughout the fall, I think it puts our guys in a really good position to understand that I'm 10 toes down for him regardless. Whether they are the best player on the team or whether they are the worst player on the team, nobody's gonna get treated any differently.”
A Mizzou program that Jackson was a part of won a Big 12 Tournament Championship in 2012. He's seen it done here before, but Mizzou baseball needs to believe again. Jackson believes that if there was one goal that this team needs to have entering this season, it's regaining that belief success can be had in Columbia.
“I think that's one of the things that we've struggled with always here is believing in ourselves, believing what we're capable of," he said. "Too many times, I think our program has been a victim of this over the last few years of falling in the trap of what others say we can and can't do. Really just getting our guys to understand that they're in control of their own destiny, go out and do what it is you're supposed to do and what you're capable of doing."
Jackson has tried to instill that belief with what he calls the Tiger ARC. The letters stand for accountability, respect and connectivity. Entering the 2024 season Mizzou will be led by Jackson and the new Tiger coaching staff with, hopefully, an entirely new mindset.
“When February 16th comes, I'm putting that uniform on again, but now I'm putting it on as the head of the program. It'll have just a little bit of a different meaning to it," he said. "Year one is a foundation year. So let's lay the foundation and continue to build on that. I'm excited for what we've done with our kids at this point and then see them go out and execute."
The first game is now less than two months away. On, February 16th, Mizzou will travel to California to face Cal-Poly and begin the Kerrick Jackson era.
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