Jon Paul Mueller (born January 26, 1970) is an American

college baseball College baseball is baseball that is played by Student athlete, student-athletes at institutions of higher education. In the United States, college baseball is sanctioned mainly by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA); in Japan, ...

coach who has been the head coach of Albany since the start of the 2000 season. Mueller, who was named the 2004 America East Coach of the Year, led the Great Danes to their first NCAA tournament appearance in 2007.

Playing career

Mueller attended Stillwater High School in

upstate New York Upstate New York is a geographic region of New York (state), New York that lies north and northwest of the New York metropolitan area, New York City metropolitan area of downstate New York. Upstate includes the middle and upper Hudson Valley, ...

, where he played baseball and basketball. Mueller won a state basketball championship in his senior season, 1988. He was offered a basketball scholarship at

Siena Siena ( , ; traditionally spelled Sienna in English; ) is a city in Tuscany, in central Italy, and the capital of the province of Siena. It is the twelfth most populated city in the region by number of inhabitants, with a population of 52,991 ...

, but chose instead to attend Eckerd. He played both basketball and baseball at the Florida college as a freshman and sophomore but focused exclusively on baseball as a junior and senior. He graduated in 1992. After getting his

master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional prac ...

from Saint Rose in 1994, Mueller began a seven-year professional baseball career spent entirely in independent leagues. From 1994 to 1995, he played for the Marshall Mallards and Will County Claws in the short-lived North Central League. Partway through the 1995 season, he returned to upstate New York, where he played for the

Adirondack Lumberjacks The Adirondack Lumberjacks were an independent baseball, independent professional baseball team based in Glens Falls, New York. The team moved to Bangor, Maine and became the Bangor Lumberjacks following the 2002 season. The team won the inaugura ...

from 1995 to 1996 and the

Albany-Colonie Diamond Dogs The Albany-Colonie Diamond Dogs were an independent baseball league team based in Albany, New York from 1995 to 2002. The team played at Heritage Park in Colonie. The Diamond Dogs competed in the Northeast League from 1995 to 1998 and then i ...

from 1997 to 2000. Primarily a

first baseman A first baseman, abbreviated 1B, is the player on a baseball or softball team who fields the area nearest first base, the first of four bases a baserunner must touch in succession to score a run. The first baseman is responsible for the majori ...

and an

outfielder An outfielder is a person playing in one of the three defensive positions in baseball or softball, farthest from the batter. These defenders are the left fielder, the center fielder, and the right fielder. As an outfielder, their duty is to catch ...

, Mueller had a career .286

batting average Batting average is a statistic in cricket, baseball, and softball that measures the performance of batters. The development of the baseball statistic was influenced by the cricket statistic. Cricket In cricket, a player's batting average is ...

and hit 76

home run In baseball, a home run (abbreviated HR) is scored when the Baseball (ball), ball is hit in such a way that the batting (baseball), batter is able to circle the bases and reach home plate safe (baseball), safely in one play without any error ( ...

Coaching career

Saint Rose

Mueller's first coaching job came with Saint Rose from 1993 to 1994, where he worked as an assistant while getting his master's degree.

Albany

In 1999, Mueller worked as a volunteer assistant at Albany under head coach Doug O'Brey. In the program's last season in Division II, the Great Danes went 21–21 and reached the ECAC Tournament final. Mueller was hired as Albany's head coach the following season, the Great Danes' first in Division I. Playing as an

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in Pennsylvania, United States * Independentes (English: Independents), a Portuguese artist ...

, they went 19–24. After the season, he played his last season of professional baseball. Albany joined the

America East Conference The America East Conference (AmEast) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference affiliated with NCAA Division I whose members are located in the Northeastern United States. The conference is headquartered in Boston, Massachu ...

for the 2002 season. In

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 60 ...

, the team went 37–14 and tied for second in conference. It appeared in its first America East tournament and Mueller was named the conference's

Coach of the Year Many sports leagues, sportswriting associations, and other organizations confer "Coach of the Year" awards. In some sports — including baseball and association football — the award is called the "Manager of the Year" award. Some of the ...

. Mueller led the program to its first NCAA tournament in 2007. After a 26–27 (13–11 America East) regular season, the Great Danes received the third seed in the 2007 America East tournament. There, they defeated Stony Brook in the opener and

Binghamton Binghamton ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of New York, and serves as the county seat of Broome County. Surrounded by rolling hills, it lies in the state's Southern Tier region near the Pennsylvania border, in a bowl-shaped valley at the con ...

twice to win the championship and the conference's automatic bid to the 2007 NCAA tournament. At the Fayetteville Regional, the team went 0–2, losing 9–0 to host

Arkansas Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the West South Central region of the Southern United States. It borders Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, Texas to the southwest, and Oklahoma ...

and 21–11 to second-seeded Creighton. From 2000 to 2019, eight of Mueller's players have been selected in the

Major League Baseball Draft The Major League Baseball draft (officially the Rule 4 Draft; also known as the first-year player draft or amateur draft) is the primary mechanism by which Major League Baseball (MLB) assigns amateur baseball players from high schools, colleg ...

. The highest selection was Stephen Woods in

2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...

, an 8th-round selection of the

San Francisco Giants The San Francisco Giants are an American professional baseball team based in San Francisco. The Giants compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (baseball), National League (NL) National League West, West Div ...

Head coaching record

Below is a table of Mueller's yearly records as a collegiate head baseball coach.

References

External links

Albany Great Danes bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mueller, Jon Living people 1970 births Adirondack Lumberjacks players Albany Diamond Dogs players Albany Great Danes baseball coaches Albany-Colonie Diamond Dogs players American men's basketball players Baseball coaches from New York (state) Baseball players from Saratoga County, New York Basketball players from New York (state) College of Saint Rose alumni Eckerd Tritons baseball players Eckerd Tritons men's basketball players People from Stillwater, New York Saint Rose Golden Knights baseball coaches 20th-century American sportsmen