The Charlottesville Tom Sox are excited to announce Lyndon Coleman as the team’s head coach for the 2023 season. A proven winner at all levels, Coleman is in his fifth season as head coach at Pasco-Hernando State College and has served in both head and assistant coaching positions at multiple schools and summer collegiate teams. He has coached 27 players that have gone on to play professional baseball and many others who have played in independent leagues, including four MLB players: Tyler Kinley, Josh James, Trey Amburgy, and Cody Wilson. 

Coleman has compiled a 126-75 record as a head coach, reaching 100 wins in just his 3rd season. During his career, Coleman has had five NJCAA Dll Region 8 championships and five NJCAA Dll Southeast District 10 tournament appearances. In Coleman’s first season as the head coach, he led the Bobcats to a 3rd place finish at the NJCAA DII World Series and was awarded Southeast District Coach of the Year by the NJCAA and the American Baseball Coaches Association. Most recently, the Bobcats finished the 2022 season as the Sun-Lake Conference champions.

Coleman has made winning a standard at Pasco-Hernando State College. In 2022, he guided the Bobcats to their first 40-win season, and he has been a part of the 6 winningest teams in PHSC history as both a player and a coach. This success is not limited to just on the field, but in the classroom as well. The PHSC team GPA for the past six years has been over 3.0 and they have had more than 60 players earn AA degrees since 2016. Additionally, more than 50 players have moved on to 4-year schools in the past five years.

During his 11 years of coaching college and summer collegiate baseball, Coleman has gained a reputation for developing quality players on and off the field. Prior to becoming the head coach at PHSC, he coached in two of the most historic collegiate summer leagues. He spent 2015 to 2017 coaching in the Valley Baseball League with the Winchester Royals in Winchester, VA. He acted as the pitching coach for the 2015 season and was the head coach, pitching coach, and recruiting coordinator for the 2016 and 2017 seasons. Coleman led Winchester to two consecutive playoff appearances and went 43-41 overall as the head coach. In 2016, the Royals pitching staff had a 4.44 ERA, which was fifth best in the league. They also dominated the league in stolen bases with 120 in 42 games, leading the league by nearly 40 and finishing nationally in the top five for summer collegiate baseball. In 2017, The Royals finished third in the league for ERA at 4.36 and stolen bases at 86. Coleman’s teams finished in the top half of the league in almost every other offensive category both seasons.  

In 2018, Coleman coached in the New England Collegiate Baseball League as head coach of the Keene Swamp Bats in Keene, NH, where they posted a record of 24-20. That year, Keene made the playoffs and set a league record for strikeouts as a pitching staff and led the league in stolen bases (111), five shy of the league record and top 5 in all of summer collegiate baseball. Coleman coached the MVP of the NECBL and new single-season RBI record-holder Brandon Smith, sent eight players to the All-Star game, and coached the NECBL Home Run Derby Champion Lorenzo Hampton. 

Coleman started his coaching career in 2013 at Barry University in Miami, Florida under then Head Coach Marc Pavao. Coleman acted as the catching coach during his two seasons with the Bucs, where both catchers that he mentored signed to play professional baseball. In 2015, Coleman was an infield coach under head coach Ryan Beckman at St. Petersburg College in Clearwater, FL before coming to Pasco-Hernando State College. Before being named the team’s head coach, he was the head assistant coach and recruiting coordinator for the 2016-2018 seasons at PHSC under Steve Winterling, who was the founder of the baseball program and is the current athletic director.

Coleman started his college baseball career at Pasco-Hernando State College. In 2009, he hit .314 and was a key player in finishing the season with 37 wins, the 2nd-winningest season in school history. In 2010, he hit .353 and was named All-Suncoast Conference. Coleman finished the last two years of his college career at Barry University in Miami, Florida. In 2011, the Bucs went 20-4 and won the Sunshine State Conference while finishing with a school-record 40 wins that season. In the summer of 2011, he played for the Covington Lumberjacks in the Valley Baseball League where he finished the season hitting .343 (third-best in the league) and won the Valley League Championship. Coleman graduated from Barry University in 2013 with a bachelor’s degree in physical education and a minor in coaching. He has since graduated from Capella University with a Masters in sports psychology.