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Founder & CEO
Casey Kroll
Casey Kroll founded The Big Man Foundation in 2020 and leads it as CEO, overseeing its strategy, programs, and growth. Every initiative traces back to one job: walking alongside coaches and their families when life gets hard.
background
athlete. coach. founder.
Casey played offensive line at James Madison University from 2011 to 2015, earning CAA Academic All-Conference honors, a place in the National Football Foundation's Hampshire Honor Society, and JMU's Athletic Director's Scholar-Athlete Award. He went on to earn a Master of Public Administration from JMU, focused on nonprofit studies under the mentorship of Dr. Jennifer Taylor, and a Master of Liberal Studies from SMU, concentrating in organizational dynamics.
He then spent four seasons coaching college football: at JMU, including the 2016 FCS national championship season; at Lamar University in 2017; and at SMU in 2018 and 2019.
Coaching at SMU, 2019
WHY BMF
Before there was BMF,
There was Coach powell.
Coach Jamal Powell spent his life pouring into other people: players, coaches, friends, and family. He called his offensive linemen the Big Man Fraternity, and it was always bigger than football. It was people taking care of people.
Coach Powell with future Super Bowl champion Aaron Stinnie (#70) and future BMF founder Casey Kroll (#59), JMU, 2015
In early 2020, Casey stepped away from coaching, asked Coach Powell for his blessing to build an organization around that idea, and moved home to Virginia to start it. Pushed by his former college roommate, Lou Chiccehitto, to think bigger than a one-time GoFundMe, Casey founded The Big Man Foundation that year with Lou and Dr. Jennifer Taylor. Aaron Stinnie and Bryan Schor joined [the founding board] soon after.
Coach Powell passed away from cancer in 2021, at just 39. His legacy remains the heart of everything BMF does.
With Coach Powell at JMU, 2016
With Coach Powell at SMU, 2019
1981–2021. BMF Forever.
It started in what Casey calls the "lemonade stand phase," funded entirely out of pocket, with no loans, no seed money, and no one bankrolling it. BMF has since grown into a nationally recognized nonprofit with sustainable funding, credible partnerships, and impact across the country.
Casey credits BMF's founding board, whose early belief in the mission and in him laid the foundation, and mentors including Melissa German, Rich Von Gersdorff, and Rob Marino for helping him grow as a nonprofit leader.
off the field
at home.
Casey lives outside of Washington, D.C., in the Virginia countryside with his wife, Hailey; their son, Sam; their daughter, Riley; and Coach, their Labrador retriever and BMF's official morale officer.
Casey's dog, Coach
