One of the biggest question marks for coach Brad Bohannon’s first year at Alabama was who was going to be on his coaching staff. In the past two weeks, Bohannon has hired two new assistant coaches, Jerry Zulli and Jason Jackson.
Zulli was hired on June, 9, while Jackson was hired on June 13.
Zulli was an assistant coach at Louisiana Tech last year, and has spent time in the SEC, making
a stop at Missouri. In his 15 years of coaching, Zulli has built a reputation as a strong recruiter and one of the better hitting coaches in the country.
“I am so excited to add Jerry to our staff,” said Bohannon. “When you’re heavily involved in recruiting, you know who does a great job on the road, and he is clearly one of the best recruiters. I’ve known him a long time, and he checks every box that I am looking for. He’s a guy of high integrity and character, he has a high motor, he can relate to a wide variety of personalities, he has a great network and is a very talented evaluator.”
“In addition, he is a very skilled instructor, and we share a lot of the same ideas regarding team offense,” said Bohannon. “Jerry is a tremendous addition to my coaching staff and will be a huge part of helping us build this program at Alabama.”
While Zulli was at Louisiana Tech, the Bulldogs were ranked in the top three in almost every offensive category.
As a recruiter, he recruited five players that were selected in the first round of the 2016 MLB draft.
Zulli has also had coaching jobs at Memphis, Middle Georgia and the University of South Alabama.
Jackson comes from Florida Atlantic. He spent 16 years there and was the pitching coach for nine years.
“I am really excited to add Jason to my coaching team,” said Bohannon. “As I worked through putting this staff together, I made dozens of phone calls and his name kept coming up. I was looking for a coach who has an outstanding track record of developing pitchers, someone who has proven that they can evaluate and recruit at an extremely high level and a person of high character and integrity who connects well with young people. Once I got Jason on campus and spent time with him, I knew he was the perfect fit for what Alabama baseball needs at this point in time.”
His pitchers struck out 444, while walking only 131 this past season. His pitching staff led the Owls to a Conference-USA regular-season championship in 2016.
In his time at Florida Atlantic, 13 of his pitchers were selected in the MLB draft.
Jackson has also spent time as a coach at the University of South Alabama, Mercer and North Florida Community College.
