2006 Amherst Mickey Mantle Coaching Staff

After guiding the team to a 15-4 record in his inaugural campaign, head coach Kevin Graber enters his second season with the Amherst Mickey Mantle program with a wealth of experience as both a player and coach in and around professional and collegiate baseball. After twice earning first-team all-conference honors and captaining the College of Saint Rose to consecutive league titles and a pair of NCAA Division II Regional berths, Graber rebounded from a life-threatening illness to carve out a career in professional baseball that included stops in Australia, Arizona, Minnesota, Upstate New York and countless cities and towns in between. In his best season as a professional, Graber batted .311 for the Southern Minnesota Stars of the Class A Prairie League and would later manage the team to a 48-24 record and its first-ever playoff appearance, earning Prairie League Manager of the Year honors as the youngest field manager in all of professional baseball. The following year, Graber managed the Adirondack Lumberjacks of the Class AA Northern League before moving on to a career in collegiate athletics administration. Along the way, Graber has held paying positions and volunteered his services with a number of semi-pro, high school, collegiate and summer-collegiate baseball programs, including Lassen College (Susanville, California), the University of West Alabama (Livingston, Alabama), McLintock High School (Mesa, Arizona), Riverland Community College (Austin, Minnesota), the Electric City Giants (Mountains Collegiate Baseball League), the Scotia Sox (Scotia, NY), the Schenectady Mohawks (New York Collegiate Baseball League) and the Pine Rivers Rapids (Queensland, Australia). He's also run several professional tryouts and has instructed at camps and clinics both regionally and nationally. Graber was recently inducted into the Schenectady (N.Y.) Baseball Hall of Fame and currently works as the Director of Alumni and Parent Programs at Amherst College.  He also serves as an assistant coach for the Amherst College baseball team.  He and his wife Tina have three children: Katie (8), Kyle (5) and Kelly (4).

Graber is assisted by Tani Cohen, a standout third baseman on the 2005 Mantle squad and a varsity player at Amherst Regional High School, and Tanner Lipsett, a 2002 Grinnell College graduate and varsity basketball captain and the current director of sports information at Amherst College.

TOP