Perez Knowles is entering his second year as the pitching coach for the Grambling State University baseball team. Within these two years, Coach Perez has assisted with leading the Tigers to their first SWAC West Division title since 2017.
Prior to Knowles joining the Grambling State Baseball staff, he was the pitching coach at Columbus State University (CSU) in Georgia, an NCAA Division 2 powerhouse. From 2019 to 2022, Coach Perez assisted in 2 NCAA D2 Regional appearances, 1 NCAA D2 Super Regional appearance, 1 Peach Belt Conference Regular Season Championship, and 1 Peach Belt Conference tournament championship. During his time at Columbus State, the pitching staff continuously maintained a top 4 spot in The Peach Belt Conference.
Before beginning his coaching career, Knowles was a 4-year NCAA student athlete. Coach Perez started playing baseball at Troy University from 2014 to 2016 and then transferred to Columbus State University from 2016 to 2018. During his senior year (2018), Knowles was a part of a CSU team that ran at a National Championship. The team ended the year with a 48-15 record, the NCAA Division 2 National Champion Runner-up, and the Southeast Regional Champion. During that year, he accumulated 118 innings pitched with 128 strikeouts in 18 starts,19 appearances, and an ERA of 3.44. He was awarded 2nd team in the Peach-Belt Conference. In his junior season, he posted a 1.77 ERA coming out of the bullpen for CSU. In the summer of 2018, Knowles inked a free agent deal in professional baseball that landed him in the Cincinnati Reds minor league system.
Coach Knowles is a native of Freeport, Grand Bahama, in the Bahamas. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Kinesiology and a Master of Science degree in Exercise Science from Columbus State University. Knowles is also Rapsodo-certified in pitching.
