PROFILE

Andy Gossel is director of field operations for the

By John Kmitta

Lehigh Valley IronPigs, Triple-A affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies. His son Ty is manager of grounds at the Maryland SoccerPlex in Boyds, Maryland. I recently visited with both to discuss their career journeys, the father-son dynamic, lessons learned, and Ty’ s decision to follow in his father’ s footsteps.

“ I ' ve taken the least traveled path to Triple-A baseball ever,” said Andy.“ I was in education for 24 years. I started out teaching and ended up coaching, but I had some green industry background in in my past.”

Andy had worked for his father’ s excavation business, and then for his older brother’ s landscaping business.

“ When I started coaching, the fields were awful; so I just tried to jump in and start making the fields better,” he said.

Andy taught and was boys athletic director at Arlington Baptist School in Baltimore for six years, then taught, coached and served as athletic director at Covenant Christian High School in Indianapolis for 18 years. While still teaching and coaching, he spent 12 years working as member of the game day grounds crew for the Indianapolis Indians, Triple-A affiliate of the Pittsburgh Pirates. That led to the opportunity with the IronPigs, and, in 2021, Andy decided to become a full-time professional sports field manager.

22 SportsField Management | April 2026 sportsfieldmanagementonline. com