Former WKU Baseball player Casey Dykes went from playing baseball on the Hill to coaching for the New York Yankees in the World Series.
Dykes graduated with a bachelor’s degree from WKU in 2012 and his baseball career has taken off from there. In 2019, Dykes joined the New York Yankees organization and worked his way up to the title of assistant hitting coach.
Before coaching future Hall of Famers in New York, Dykes was a Sport Management Major at WKU while playing baseball for the Hilltoppers from 2009 to 2012.
During his playing career at WKU, Dykes posted a .284 batting average with 11 home runs and 95 RBIs. Dykes was a member of the last WKU baseball team to win a conference championship in 2009.
On the academic side, Dykes graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Sport Management in 2012 and proceeded to get his masters from WKU in Athletic Administration.
Dykes spoke highly of the Sport Management major and his time at WKU as a whole.
“I loved it,” Dykes said. “I love the people I got to work side by side with, the professors were great. And I thought that it kind of almost reassured me or confirmed some of the things that I thought I wanted to do. You know, I knew I wanted to be a part of sport, I knew I wanted sports in my life, in some capacity. I think going through that just continued to help educate me, but also confirm a lot of those beliefs that I had of what I wanted to do in life.”
Dykes’ coaching journey began at WKU as a graduate assistant coach for the Hilltoppers.
“I finished up playing at WKU and had some opportunities to go play independent ball,” Dykes said. “ I actually thought about maybe going down to an NAIA to pursue a fifth year playing football. I was kind of bouncing back and forth on a couple things. My now wife, Chaney, at the time, was playing basketball at Western Kentucky and we were dating. She still had some school left as I was going through that. Matt Myers, who was the head coach at the time, knew I wanted to get into coaching, and ended up offering me a position as a graduate assistant at Western.”
Following a season with WKU, Dykes moved into a volunteer role to help advance his career into his first paying job.
“I kind of moved into a volunteer assistant role the following year,” Dykes said. “From there, I took my first paid coaching job as a recruiting coordinator, hitting coach and catching coach at Virginia Military Institute. I was there for about three and a half years. Then I moved to Indiana University and was an assistant coach there until 2019.”
In his lone season as an assistant coach at Indiana University, Dykes helped lead the Hoosiers to a Big 10 title.
“At the end of that summer [2019], I got a call from the Yankees,” Dykes said. “So I joined the Yankees organization, Fall of 2019. Obviously with COVID in 2020 there was no minor league season, but also working for them in player development at the time. And then in 2021 I was the triple-A hitting coach, and then I’ve been in the big leagues since spring of 2022.”
In his time in the Bronx, the Yankees have seen some serious success. The Yankees have won over 90 games in two of the three seasons since Dykes joined the team and have had a winning record in all three.
The Yankees’ offense was one of the best in the league in 2022 and 2024. New York led the league in home runs in both years and ranked in the top five in OPS in each of those seasons.
After a more mediocre hitting season in 2023, the Yankees brought in Juan Soto, a perennial MVP candidate, to join Aaron Judge, a two-time MVP.
“I’m extremely fortunate, extremely blessed, to be able to show up to, quote, unquote, work, every day and get to watch those guys do what they do,” Dykes said. “Not only are those guys great players, they’re incredible humans, incredible teammates. They’re a blast to coach, to work with on a day to day basis.”
James Rowson took over the title of hitting coach for the Yankees in 2024, joining assistant hitting coaches Pat Roessler and Dykes. Under Dykes, Rowson and Roessler both Judge and Soto had outstanding 2024 seasons, in which each of them became MVP finalists.
“It’s special,” Dykes said. “You know, I think there will probably be a day when I’m old and retired and kind of done where I look back and see these guys, and the records they broke and the impact they made on the game, and where it all starts to really hit me. Right now, I don’t know if it’s quite hit me yet, but I guess I definitely don’t take it for granted.”
In the very competitive field of sports and coaching Dykes advises people coming into the field to know that “no job is ever too small for you to do.” Dykes said.
“I’ve done it all, like I’ve cleaned bathrooms. I’ve had to plant sod and edge the infield, run tournaments, run concession stands at tournaments, be the ticket guy at tournaments,” Dykes said “All these little jobs that kind of make sports work, I’ve had to do a lot of them. And all of them have, they’ve helped me and taught me the little nuances of the profession.”
Dykes will enter his fourth season with the Yankees in 2025 and will look to help lead New York back to the World Series.
Sports reporter Camden Bush can be reached [email protected].
