Christian Kirtley returned to UC Santa Barbara as the Gauchos' Director of Player Development, Camps & Clinics in the summer of 2025. A former All-Big West First Team player as a student-athlete for Santa Barbara, Kirtley spent two summers playing baseball with the Glacier Range Riders of the MLB-partnered Pioneer League before returning to his alma mater. He briefly worked under David Tillotson before succeeding him as the Director of Player Development, Camps & Clinics in September of 2025.
With 32 home runs across his collegiate career, Kirtley ranks seventh in UC Santa Barbara history for long balls, and his 45-game on-base streak from 2022 is the second-longest ever by a Gaucho. He helped Santa Barbara win The Big West in both 2019 and 2022, being named to the all-conference first team in the latter of the two championship campaigns. In 2023, he hit 14 home runs, 11th most in a single season by any Gaucho, and he was named National Player of the Week after hitting four of them in five games in mid-April.
After graduation, he headed to Glacier, where he played 90 games over two seasons for the Range Riders, finishing with a .302 career average and 35 home runs.Â
A native of Highland, California, Kirtley holds a bachelor's degree in Communication from UC Santa Barbara.
