Ryan Parker was hired as an assistant coach with the Union College baseball team in 2025 and begins his first season in the dugout with the Garnet Chargers in 2026, serving as the team’s pitching coach and assisting with recruiting.
Parker joined Union following two seasons on staff at Russell Sage College where he helped guide the Gators to a 2024 Empire 8 regular-season title and earned Empire 8 Coaching Staff of the Year honors. His previous collegiate coaching stops include serving as associate head coach and pitching coach at Worcester State University (2016), head coach at Fitchburg State University (2015), and an extended tenure as an assistant coach at his alma mater, Wheaton College (Mass.), where he contributed to over 400 program wins across 14 seasons.
During his time at Wheaton, Parker helped the Lyons capture 10 NEWMAC championships, make 11 NCAA Tournament appearances, advance to three NCAA Division III College World Series, and finish as national runner-up twice (2006, 2012). Under his direction, Wheaton’s pitching staff ranked in the top 10 nationally in eight times, including two top-five finishes, and led the nation in WHIP in 2021.
Over his coaching career, Parker has coached 23 all-conference pitchers, including six conference pitchers of the year, along with multiple Major League Baseball signees. He is a two-time Wheaton Athletics Hall of Fame inductee as a member of the 2006 and 2012 baseball teams.
Parker has also served as pitching coach for the Harwich Mariners of the Cape Cod Baseball League, one of the nation’s premier collegiate summer leagues. During his tenure, he helped guide Harwich to the 2008 league championship, ending a 21-year title drought. In 2025, his pitching staff led the league in ERA (3.27), WHIP (1.26), runs allowed, walks allowed, and shutouts.
A member of Wheaton’s first varsity baseball team in 1998, Parker helped the Lyons capture three NEWMAC titles and make two NCAA Regional appearances as a right handed pitcher. He earned the win in the program’s first NEWMAC Tournament championship game in 1999 and recorded the first save in program history in 1998.
Parker is also the co-founder and head coach of the Troy Baseball Expo, a nonprofit organization in Troy, N.Y., that provides free baseball instruction, academic advising, and workforce development to youth in New York’s Capital District.
He earned his bachelor’s degree in sociology from Wheaton College in 2001 and a master’s degree in higher education counseling from Bridgewater State University (Mass.) in 2008.
