City College has hired an assistant from a NCAA Division 1 baseball program to be its head baseball coach.
Jeff Walker, an assistant at Loyola Marymount for the last three years, was named coach of the Vaqueros, SBCC Athletic Director Ryan Byrne announced Thursday.
Jeff Walker has coaching experience at the high school, JC and four-year college level.
Walker replaces Ryan Thompson, who resigned after one season in which he led the Vaqueros to a Western State Conference North Division title and a first-round regional playoff series win.
“SBCC is a special place and I’m honored to have this opportunity,” said Walker. “It’s been my lifelong dream to be a head coach at the community college level. I’m a teacher and developing solid student-athletes is the No. 1 goal.”
Walker, who played at LMU and was an all-West Coast Conference selection in 2000, has spent his coaching career working with young players. Before returning to coach at his alma mater, he spent two seasons as an assistant at Ohlone College in Fremont. During that time Ohlone qualified for the state playoffs and led the state in stolen bases.
He also has experience at the high school level, coaching at Saratoga High in the Bay Area. In his first year at Saratoga, he took a last-place team and guided it to the CIF Central Coast Section playoffs. He also served as athletic director at the school, and was honored as the section’s Athletic Director of the Year in 2005.
“He’s a perfect fit for us in terms of his educational background, teaching, administrative work and coaching,” said Byrne. “He’s a former athletic director who really understands community college policy and procedures. He’s coached at the high school, community college and 4-year levels and has had success at each one. He really has the total package.”
Since 2002, Walker has spent his summers coaching college ballplayers in NCAA-sanctioned leagues in Alaska and Virginia. In 2009, he was the head coach for the Peninsula Oilers in Alaska.
“He’s a tireless worker and that will transfer to any team he coaches,” said USC baseball coach Frank Cruz, who coached Walker at Loyola Marymount. “I expect Santa Barbara to be in the running for a state championship in the near future.“
Walker is a former California Community College baseball star. After graduating from St. Francis High in Mountain View, he attended Cañada College in Redwood City, where he earned all-conference and JC All-American honors. He holds the school’s single-season home run record with 18 in 1998.
I know a player who played for him in Alaska – feedback was that he was kind of a prima donna but a good X’s and O’s coach – I give him 2 years before he gets fed up cow towing to the women’s softball coach and goes back to a D1 gig that he already tasted
BTW – just because the bums loitering around the baseball field pee in dugout does not mean you can do it.