South Carolina baseball coach Paul Mainieri has many Gamecock fans optimistic about the state of the program.
Much of this optimism comes from Mainieri's coaching staff hires as Monte Lee (associate head coach/hitting coach), Terry Rooney (pitching coach/recruiting coordinator), and John Hendry (assistant pitching coach/assistant recruiting coordinator) make up one of the top assistant coaching groups in the country. Ryan West also is set to return in the off-field role of director of baseball operations.
It was announced on Monday through a release from the athletics department that the new Gamecock head coach rounded out his staff. Filling the "off-field" role of director of player development, Chris Gordon has been hired by the University of South Carolina. Gordon's role also will include the titles of "director of analytics" and "camp coordinator." He will have a hand in just about every aspect of South Carolina baseball.
Gordon, who spent the previous two years with the Texas Longhorns, is joining the Gamecocks after coaching for 17 years across multiple positions. He has coached at Milligan College (his alma mater), East Tennessee State, Duke, and Texas and has worked with pitchers, hitters, catchers, recruiting, and analytics. In other words: Chris Gordon has been involved in just about anything a college coach can be involved with during his career.
While coaching at Duke and Texas, Gordon helped develop several all-conference and All-American performers, something that has been lacking for the Gamecocks in recent years despite a large number of talented players on the roster each season.
Gordon replaces Mike Current, who served for seven years on Mark Kingston's staff (the entire time Kingston was the head coach at USC) after following Kingston to Columbia from South Florida and Illinois State. Five of those seasons saw Current play the role of the South Carolina baseball program's director of player development.