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Jim Brady | Baseball Head Coach
P: 314-516-5647
E: bradyja@umsl.edu
Jim Brady is entering his 27th season as head coach at UMSL.
Brady owns a career record of 678-531-5, the most wins for any head coach in any sport in UMSL Athletics. Entering the 2011 season, he was ranked 15th among NCAA Division II active coaches for the most career wins (665) and ranked 40th all-time in career victories.
Brady recorded win number 650 with an 8-7 victory over Drury in the 2009 season finale.
During the 2007 season, Brady recorded his 600th career win with a victory over Saint Rose (NY), becoming the 47th coach in NCAA Division II history to reach that milestone.
Early in the 2003 season, he recorded career victory number 500 with an 11-4 victory over the University of Central Missouri and was the 29th active Division II coach to record 500 wins. His longevity and stability in the program has been a key ingredient to the success the UMSL program has shown under the tutelage of Brady.
UMSL has had a winning season for all but six years that Brady has been the head coach. The teams have had 30 or more wins 11 times in the last 17 years, including a school-record of 39-15 record in 2003. In that historic 2003 season, Brady led UMSL to a first-place regular season finish in the GLVC and also won the GLVC Tournament, recording UMSL’s first ever conference title since joining the GLVC. UMSL also earned a bid and a first-place seed to the NCAA Regionals, their first trip to the Regionals since the 1998 season.
The 1998 team finished with a 32-15 record and a bid to the NCAA Regionals. In 1996, Brady guided the team to a then school record 37-9 record, a first-place conference regular season finish, an NCAA Regional title and a berth in the Division II College World Series. In addition, Brady also led UMSL to back-to-back NCAA Regional appearances in 1992 and 1993. In 1993, Brady led the team to its first appearance in the Division II College World Series since the 1977 season, and it’s first during his tenure.
Thus far in his career at UMSL, Brady has coached 13 All-American players, 54 all-regional players and 86 all-conference players in either the MIAA or the GLVC. He has also coached five players who earned All-Conference and All-Region Player or Pitcher of the Year, and one Conference Freshman of the Year. Brady has been awarded with the Central Region Coach of the Year Award twice, in 1993 and again in 1996.
He was inducted into the St. Louis Amateur Baseball Hall of Fame in 2008.
In addition to his coaching duties at UM-St. Louis, Brady has served as an assistant coach at the U.S. Olympic National Baseball trials in 1992, and was honored by the Multiple Sclerosis Society for excellence in coaching in 1994.
Prior to being named the head coach, he assumed the pitching coach duties at UM-St. Louis in 1984 under former head coach Jim Dix. That year, Brady guided UMSL to a league-leading ERA as a team.
Before arriving at UMSL, Brady served as a teacher and assistant baseball and football coach at Parkway South High School for five years. He has also served as an assistant coach at Missouri State and helped guide the Bears to back-to-back post-season appearances in 1977 and 1978.
Brady played collegiate baseball at nearby Meramec Community College, and later went on to play at Division I Missouri State University in Springfield, Mo.
He has two sons, Kyle and Tyler and his grandfather, the late William C. Brady, is a member of the St. Louis Soccer Hall of Fame.
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Ric Lessmann | Baseball Assistant Coach - Pitching
P: -
Ric Lessmann is in his first season as pitching coach for the UMSL baseball program.
Lessmann comes to UMSL from Washington University in St. Louis, where he retired this past spring after 17 years at the helm of the program. The all-time winningest coach in WUSTL history, Lessmann compiled an overall record of 396-231-1 with the Bears.
While at Washington U., Lessmann guided the program to 12 consecutive winning seasons dating back to the 1999 campaign, and his 2006 squad posted a program-record 34-7 overall mark. Eleven of his 16 teams won at least 20 games and he guided four squads to postseason play, including a stretch of three-straight NCAA appearances from 2005-2007.
Prior to becoming the coach at Washington U. in 1994, Lessmann spent 27 years as the baseball coach at Meramec Community College, where he never experienced a losing season. He led nine teams to the junior college World Series and won the national championship in 1974.
In 1995, Lessmann became just the 18th coach in collegiate baseball history to eclipse 1,000 career wins, and he was the third winningest baseball coach in junior college history.
In 45 seasons as a collegiate baseball coach he tallied an overall record of 1,365-556-1 for a winning percentage of .711.
Lessmann was inducted into the National Junior College Athletic Association Hall of Fame in 1991, and was a 1992 inductee into the St. Louis Amateur Baseball Hall of Fame.
A graduate of St. Louis’ Southwest High, Lessmann signed with the New York Yankees at the age of 17 as a left-handed pitcher. During his time as a minor league ball player, he pitched a no-hitter in the Midwest League in 1955.
Lessmann studied at Harris Teachers College (now Harris-Stowe) during the off-seasons and earned his degree in 1960. He earned his master’s from WU in 1963 and began his tenure at Meramec in 1966. Lessmann also completed 36 postgraduate hours at St. Louis University in educational administration.
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