Bobby Wernes, who played two years for the Razorbacks under head coach Dave Van Horn, completed his fourth season as an assistant coach for the Arkansas baseball program in 2024.
Wernes, who served as the program’s volunteer assistant coach for three seasons before he was promoted to a full-time role on the coaching staff, assists as a hitting and infield coach while also working with the Razorbacks’ catchers. Since he joined the coaching staff, Arkansas has made one trip to the College World Series (2022), clinched a pair of overall SEC titles (2021, 2023) and captured three SEC Western Division titles (2021, 2023, 2024).
Additionally, with Wernes on staff, Arkansas won Collegiate Baseball’s national recruiting championship for the first time in program history in 2023 as their star-studded recruiting class was named the nation’s best by the publication.
The Razorbacks posted a 43-18 overall record in 2023, claiming their fourth overall SEC championship and their second in the last three seasons. Arkansas belted 92 home runs during the historic campaign, tying for fourth-most in a season in program history. Arkansas also became the only SEC program, and one of just two teams in the country, to record 40 or more wins in each of the last six full seasons.
In 2022, Arkansas posted a 46-21 overall record, highlighted by the program’s 11th trip to the College World Series and its third trip to Omaha since the 2018 season. At the time, the Razorbacks were the only team in the country with at least 45 wins in each of the last five full seasons.
In 2021, Wernes’ first season on staff, Arkansas won its first SEC overall title since 2004 and its first outright SEC crown since 1999. The Razorbacks became only the second team since the SEC expanded to 30 games to win all 10 of their conference series. Arkansas capped its regular-season SEC championship with the program’s first SEC Tournament championship, becoming only the third SEC team since league play expanded in 2012 to win both the regular season and tournament championship in the same season.
Wernes joined the Arkansas staff after spending two years coaching in the Philadelphia Phillies’ organization with the Gulf Coast League (GCL) Phillies West. In 2019, he served as the team’s hitting coach, helping the club to a 33-15 record and a first-place finish in the North Division. Under his guidance, the Phillies West squad led the GCL in team batting average and was second among the 18 teams in slugging percentage, averaging 5.13 runs per game.
Wernes was promoted to manager of the Phillies West in 2020 and was slated to be one of the youngest managers in professional baseball before the minor league season was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Before beginning his coaching career, Wernes played for the Razorbacks from 2014-15 and was drafted by the Houston Astros in the 30th round of the 2015 MLB Draft. He played four years of pro ball, including two years in the Astros organization and two years in the Colorado Rockies’ system, reaching Double-A Hartford in 2018.
Wernes appeared in 121 games over his two years as a Razorback, racking up 103 hits, 45 RBI and 68 runs scored. He started 55 of 56 games in 2014 as a sophomore and registered 10 multi-hit games, including a double, 18 RBI and 18 runs scored.
He played in all 65 games for the Razorbacks in 2015, hitting .279 with seven doubles, five homers and a team-high six triples. That season, Wernes was named to the SEC All-Defensive Team and played an integral part in the Arkansas’ eighth overall College World Series berth.
Bobby and his wife, Kristina, an Arkansas graduate, have a daughter, Lillian.
