The National Baseball Hall of Fame is peppered with players who finished long, distinguished careers by donning a Dodgers uniform, their performance dwindling as their age increased. Greg Maddux, Rickey Henderson, Juan Marichal and Eddie Murray are among those who leap to mind.
An exception was Jeff Kent, who Sunday received 14 of 16 possible votes by the Contemporary Baseball Era Committee, the only player among eight on the ballot with enough for induction into Cooperstown.
With unmatched power as a second baseman and an unrelenting approach to his craft, Kent was a Dodger for the last four seasons of his 17-year career, solidifying his Hall of Fame credentials statistically while also serving as a curmudgeonly leader on a roster crowded with young stars such as Matt Kemp, Russell Martin, Andre Ethier and James Loney.
“It’s a moment of satisfaction of the things I did right in my career, the things I consistently stuck to,” he told MLB Network. “The hard work, the gratification of playing the game the right way. I love the game.”
The son of a motorcycle cop and a product of Huntington Beach Edison High, Kent became emotional during a news conference at the 2005 MLB Winter Meetings when it was announced that he’d signed a two-year, $17 million contract with the Dodgers.
“This is the third time I’ve tried to get with the Dodgers,” he said at the time. “I want to be on a team with the potential to win because I’m running out of time. This team has that mentality.”
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The Dodgers never won a World Series during Kent’s tenure, but he quickly fell into the role of a veteran leader, making himself available to the media after tough losses to shield younger players from the glare.
He said what was on his mind, sometimes to a fault, once suggesting that legendary Dodgers broadcaster Vin Scully “talks too much.”
Maybe that’s why Kent getting the Hall of Fame nod from a list of candidates that included all-time home run leader Barry Bonds, 354-game winner Roger Clemens, 509-home run slugger Gary Sheffield, 1980s stars Don Mattingly and Dale Murphy, and Dodgers icon Fernando Valenzuela was unexpected.
Even Kent was surprised.
“The emotions are overwhelming — unbelievable,” Kent said. “I didn’t even expect it. For me, there were so many quality guys that the committee had to argue through and vote for. I’m grateful that they considered me and gave it a shot at putting me in.”
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Valenzuela, Bonds, Clemens and Sheffield each had fewer than five votes, meaning they will not be eligible the next time their era is considered in 2018. They can be nominated once more at that time, but will not be eligible for consideration if they again fall short of five votes.
All of the candidates already had been spurned by the Baseball Writers Assn. of America. Seventy-five percent of the votes are necessary for induction, and Kent never received even 50% during his 10 years on the BBWAA ballot that ended in 2023.
“The time had gone by, and you just leave it alone, and I left it alone,” Kent said. “I loved the game, and everything I gave to the game I left there on the field. This moment today, over the last few days, I was absolutely unprepared. Emotionally unstable.”
Kent was named National League Most Valuable Player in 2000 with the San Francisco Giants, the team with which his career is most associated. He batted a career-best .334 with 33 homers and 125 runs batted in that season and drove in more than 100 runs in each of his six seasons batting behind Bonds.
He said he plans to enter the Hall of Fame wearing a Giants cap.
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“The turning point in my career was with Dusty Baker, the manager I got with in San Francisco,” said Kent, who played in college at California-Berkeley. “He motivated me to get the peak performance out of me.”
Kent finished with 377 career homers, 351 as a second baseman, the most ever for the position. He also is the only second baseman to collect more than 100 RBIs in eight seasons.
As a Dodger, he hit 75 homers and batted .290 in more than 2,000 plate appearances. His last manager with the Dodgers was Joe Torre, who described Kent’s impact on the franchise.
“He’s one of those players whose actions are supposed to make you understand what he thinks,” Torre said. “It’s the old pro thing.”
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This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
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