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The 2024 season will be Michael Ryan's fourth on the coaching staff at Toledo.
Ryan is Toledo’s assistant recruiting coordinator and catching coach. He also assists with hitting and baserunning duties and serves as the Rockets’ Baseball Camp Coordinator.
In 2023 Toledo set new program records for single-season home runs (98) and stolen bases (101), leading the MAC and ranking in the Top 30 nationally in both categories. Leading the way was 2023 MAC Player of the Year Jeron Williams. He earned All-America honors from Collegiate Baseball and All-East Region honors from the ABCA while hitting .403 with 14 home runs, 48 RBIs, 67 runs scored, 16 doubles, four triples, a .681 slugging percentage, .467 on-base percentage, and an incredible 49 stolen bases. He led all of NCAA Division I in stolen bases in 2023. Williams was drafted by the Houston Astros in the ninth round of the 2023 MLB Draft.
At the plate in 2022, the Rockets hit .278 and slugged 61 home runs, just the fourth time in school history the team had hit at least 60 home runs in a season. The 346 runs scored are the second-most over the last 10 seasons, and its 85 stolen bases were a new program record. Mason Sykes slugged 16 home runs, breaking the previous single-season record held by Mike Ernst (2000), Ross Adolph (2018), and Chris Meyers (2021).
In his first year as an assistant coach in 2021, Ryan helped coach an explosive offense that led the conference in extra-base hits (187) and slugging percentage (.459), and averaged 6.3 runs per game. Chris Meyers earned the program's first-ever MAC Player of the Year award that year and was drafted by the Detroit Tigers in the 13th round of the 2021 MLB Draft.
Ryan joined the coaching staff prior to the 2021 season after wrapping up an excellent playing career the previous spring. The Holly, Mich. native was a mainstay behind the plate for the Rockets for four seasons, making 100 starts at catcher during his career. Ryan slugged nine home runs and drove in 58 runs at the plate while at Toledo, including a career-best 21 RBIs in 2018. He played in 49 games as a freshman and 48 as a sophomore, but injuries and a shortened 2020 season limited Ryan to just 27 games played since the start of 2019. A well-respected leadership figure in the locker room, he earned the role of team captain as a senior in 2020.
Ryan graduated with a bachelor's degree in business administration in May 2020.
