Bio

Coaching veteran Brett Kimbrel is in his seventh season as head baseball coach and ninth year overall at East Mississippi Community College.

After two seasons as EMCC’s assistant baseball coach, Kimbrel was promoted to the head position following the Lions’ 2018 season.

Benefitting from their recently improved baseball facilities, including a fully turfed playing field, the Lions have put together a post-COVID, four-year composite record of 100-85 that has included a 47-37 collective conference mark and consecutive postseason tournament appearances over the last three seasons. This past year with a sophomore-laden team, the Lions posted their winningest baseball season in 10 years at 30-22 overall and 15-13 in MACCC play while having also recorded the highest team batting average during Kimbrel’s EMCC head coaching era.

Three years ago, the Lions enjoyed a breakout campaign by posting records of 28-19 overall and 20-8 in conference play to finish third in the 2022 MACCC regular-season standings before earning a No. 2 regional seeding while making the program’s first NJCAA Region 23 Tournament appearance in seven years.

Since Kimbrel’s arrival on the Scooba campus in 2016, the Lions have had nearly 70 players move on to continue their baseball careers at the four-year collegiate level or professionally, including current Boston Red Sox minor league prospect Tyler Miller (Auburn) as well as 2017 Major League Baseball Draft selections Vijay Miller (Padres) and Marcus Ragan (Red Sox).

In the classroom, the Lions have shown unprecedented academic success under Kimbrel’s guidance with yearly NJCAA All-Academic Team achievements and multiple student-athlete recognitions. This past year, EMCC ranked 10^th nationally with a program-best 3.57 composite team grade point average that also included new program standards with 20 NJCAA All-Academic student-athlete selections and 11 first-team honorees with 4.0 GPAs.    

Having brought his vast baseball knowledge and dedicated experience within the Alabama community college system to EMCC, Kimbrel previously spent 12 successful seasons as an assistant coach on Bobby Sprowl’s Shelton State Community College baseball staff. In addition to working with six NJCAA All-Americans at the Tuscaloosa-based school, Kimbrel helped tutor 22 players who signed with SEC schools as well as 13 MLB Draft selections.

Kimbrel also helped Shelton State win at a 65-percent clip with four NJCAA Division I College World Series appearances as a result of an impressive run that also earned four Alabama Community College Conference state championships within a six-year span.

Kimbrel’s association with Sprowl began when Shelton State’s veteran head coach and retired Troy (Ala.) University head baseball coach Bobby Pierce were assistant coaches on Barry Shollenberger’s University of Alabama staff in the early 1990s. Kimbrel had previously received his first coaching job on Pierce’s Chipola (Fla.) Junior College staff a decade earlier and was invited to continue his education as a student assistant for the Crimson Tide during the 1991 and 1992 seasons.

Having had the proud distinction of coaching with two Alabama Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Famers and University of Alabama All-Century Team members in Sprowl and Pierce, Kimbrel was recognized as the 2008 ALABCA Assistant Coach of the Year when Shelton State went 49-19 and finished as NJCAA Division I national runners-up.

At the prep level, Kimbrel had successful assistant coaching stints at Holt High School and Tuscaloosa Academy along with having gained valuable head coaching experience in his home state of Florida at Grand Ridge High School.

Kimbrel is the father of two sons, Brett and Blake, and has two granddaughters, Brighton and Vivian, along with two grandsons, Ben and Forrest.