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Christian Stephen Yelich (born December 5, 1991) is an American professional baseball left fielder for the Milwaukee Brewers of Major League Baseball (MLB). He has previously played in MLB for the Miami Marlins. Internationally, Yelich represents the United States. In the 2017 World Baseball Classic (WBC), he helped win Team USA's first gold medal in a WBC tournament and was named to the All-World Baseball Classic Team.
The Marlins selected Yelich in the first round of the 2010 MLB draft. He made his MLB debut for the Marlins in 2013 and was traded to the Brewers in the 2017–18 offseason. Yelich is a three-time MLB All-Star, a three-time Silver Slugger Award winner, a two-time National League batting champion, a Gold Glove Award recipient in 2014, and the winner of the National League's Most Valuable Player Award in 2018.
Yelich accepted a scholarship to play college baseball for the Miami Hurricanes baseball team.
On July 23, 2013, the Marlins promoted Yelich to MLB from the Double-A Jacksonville Suns.
In the 2014 season, Yelich batted .284 with 21 steals out of the leadoff spot for the Miami Marlins. He also won a Gold Glove Award in left field, becoming the franchise's youngest ever player and first outfielder to win the award. During the season, Yelich set a franchise record for fielding percentage in left field, at .996. He served as the final out of Jordan Zimmermann's no-hitter on September 28, 2014, when Steven Souza Jr. made a diving play to save the no-hitter.
Yelich and the Marlins finalized a seven-year, $49.57 million contract extension on March 22, 2015. He struggled to start the season, and was placed on the disabled list in April with lower back strain before making his return on May 8. His batting average reached a season low of .178 on May 22. In August, Yelich bruised his right knee and was again placed on the disabled list. Yelich had improved from his earlier offensive struggles and was hitting .275/.343/.376 with six home runs, 29 RBIs and 14 stolen bases up to that point in the season. Despite aggravating the injury shortly after his return, Yelich remained an active player for the quality of his bat. Near the end of the season, Yelich shared the field with Marcell Ozuna, the outfielder who had replaced him during his second stint on the disabled list. Yelich closed the 2015 season with a .300 average. For the season, he had the highest ground ball percentage (62.5%), and the lowest fly ball percentage (15.0%), of all major league hitters.
Yelich was projected to bat third to start 2016. He hit well in that spot, and managed to increase his power output. On April 23, in a game against the San Francisco Giants, Yelich hit three doubles, which tied a franchise record. Defensively, Yelich was a starting outfielder, alongside Ozuna and Giancarlo Stanton. In late May, Yelich missed some time due to back spasms. After Stanton was placed on the disabled list, Ozuna played Stanton's usual position in right field, while Yelich took Ozuna's spot in center on days that backup outfielder Ichiro Suzuki was unavailable.
On March 31, 2019, Yelich became the sixth player in MLB history to hit a home run in each of his team's first four games.
On July 1, 2019, Yelich became the first player in Brewers franchise history to reach 30 home runs before the All-Star Break, beating former Brewer Prince Fielder's record of 29 home runs. Yelich was selected to participate in the Home Run Derby but had to withdraw due to a back injury. He was replaced by Matt Chapman in the Home Run Derby. On September 10, 2019, Yelich hit a foul ball off his kneecap and left the game. Shortly thereafter, it was revealed that his right kneecap was fractured, which prematurely ended his 2019 season.
In 2019, Yelich won his second National League batting title. He batted .329/.429 (leading the NL)/.671 (leading the major leagues) with a 1.100 OPS (leading the majors), 44 home runs (4th in the NL), 11.1 at-bats per home runs (leading the league), a .342 Isolated Power (leading the NL), 30 stolen bases (3rd), a 93.75 stolen base percentage (3rd), and 97 RBIs in 130 games. He had the highest Hard Contact Percentage of all National League batters, at 50.8%. Yelich was the first National League player to lead the league in batting average and slugging percentage in consecutive seasons since Rogers Hornsby, who did so from 1920 to 1925. He won the NL Hank Aaron Award for the second year in a row and finished second in NL MVP voting.
After the 2019 season, Yelich became the only player in Major League Baseball history to have consecutive seasons hitting .325 or higher with 35 or more homers and 20 or more steals.
On March 6, 2020, Yelich signed a nine-year, $215 million contract extension with the Brewers, more than doubling Ryan Braun's previous record of $105 million for the richest contract in franchise history. In the shortened 60-game 2020 season, he hit .205/.356/.430 with 12 home runs.
At the start of the 2021 season, Yelich had a lingering back problem that caused him to spend over half of April and the first few weeks of May on the injured list.
Yelich hit his third career cycle on May 11, 2022, becoming the sixth player in MLB history to do so, and the first player to accomplish three cycles against the same team, the Cincinnati Reds.
In 2022, he had the highest ground ball percentage of all major leaguers (58.6%), the lowest fly ball percentage (23.0%), and batted .252/.355/.383.
In the 2024 season, Yelich's season stats as of early July had nearly matched the weighted runs created plus (wRC+) he achieved in his MVP and near-MVP seasons of 2018 and 2019. However, he was placed on the injured list with a back issue on July 24. Despite Yelich's attempt to put off a back surgery until after the season, he and the team announced on August 15 that he would be entering surgery the next day with the hope of returning in 2025. On September 8, the team officially ended Yelich's season by transferring him to the 60-day injured list.
On May 5, 2025, Yelich played his 1,500th career game against the Houston Astros, where he went 1–for–3 in the game with a solo home run, two RBIs, a stolen base, and walked just once. With that milestone, he becomes the 730th player to reach that milestone. On May 27, Yelich hit a grand slam walk-off home run in the bottom of the 10th inning to beat the Boston Red Sox 5-1. It was his first career walk-off home run. On May 30 against the Philadelphia Phillies, Yelich notched his 12th multi-homer game as a Brewer. He tied Milwaukee legends Richie Sexson and Rob Deer for 9th-most in franchise history. On June 2, Yelich was named the National League Player of the Week for May 26-June 1, a span in which he batted .500 (10–20) with 5 Runs, 3 home runs, 9 RBI, and an OPS of 1.545. This is the sixth time that Yelich has won a Player of the Week award, but the first since April 2019. Yelich also had an on-base streak of 30 consecutive games, from June 15 to July 25.
On July 28, against the Chicago Cubs, Yelich hit his 20th home run of the season, which made 2025 his first season since 2019 where he'd hit at least 20 home runs in a season.
On September 10, 2018, he was selected to play with the MLB All-Stars at the 2018 MLB Japan All-Star Series, but he later withdrew from the event.
Yelich's paternal great-grandfather was a Serb from Trebinje, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Yelich was baptized in the Serbian Orthodox Church as Risto Šćepan Jelić (Ристо Шћепан Јелић). His maternal grandfather was Japanese people.
Yelich appeared (as himself) in an episode of Magnum P.I. that aired on March 4, 2019. His scene was with the 2018 Honolulu Little League World Champions in which he homers off a pitch from series protagonist Orville "Rick" Wright (played by Zachary Knighton). Yelich once invited Cleveland Browns quarterback and 2017 Heisman Trophy winner Baker Mayfield to Brewers batting practice.
Yelich grew up both a Los Angeles Dodgers fan and a New York Yankees fan.
Yelich owns property in Malibu, California. In October 2021, he purchased a $6.5 million home in Paradise Valley, Arizona, from NHL player Oliver Ekman-Larsson.
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