Jeff Kent: National Baseball Hall of Famer & California Golden Bear
Cal Baseball alum and all-time HR leading 2B is elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame via Contemporary Era Ballot
Five-time MLB All-Star, four-time NL Silver Slugger, and 2000 NL MVP Jeff Kent has been elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Kent spent 17 seasons in the MLB, where he was primarily known as the San Francisco Giants' RBI-slugging second baseman for six years.
A California Golden Bear from 1987-1989, Kent batted .349 in his freshman season and .193 in his sophomore year before sitting out the 1989 season due to a wrist injury. He still declared for the 1989 MLB Draft and was selected in the 20th round by the Toronto Blue Jays before making a name for himself in his long professional career.
Kent’s selection to the National Baseball Hall of Fame comes via the Contemporary Baseball Era committee, which is a Veterans committee/panel made up of 16 former baseball players and non-players (managers, executives, and umpires) to consider prior players for the Hall who played in the post-1980 MLB era. According to MLB.com, “Hall of Famers Fergie Jenkins, Jim Kaat, Juan Marichal, Tony Pérez, Ozzie Smith, Alan Trammell and Robin Yount; MLB executives Mark Attanasio, Doug Melvin, Arte Moreno, Kim Ng, Tony Reagins and Terry Ryan; and media members/historians Steve Hirdt, Tyler Kepner and Jayson Stark” made up this years’ Contemprary Baseball Era Players Committee, which chose Cal Baseball alumni Jeff Kent, over all-time MLB home run leading Barry Bonds, seven-time Cy-Young Award winner Roger Clemons, nine-time Gold Glover Don Mattingly, and 473 career home run hitting Carlos Delgado.
Kent’s name was on 14 of the 16 Contemporary Committee ballots submitted (87.5%) and will be inducted into Cooperstown, New York, on July 26th, 2026. Kent will be the first California Golden Bear represented at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, and will don an “interlocking SF cap” in his official plaque.
A career .290 hitter, Kent holds the MLB record for the most home runs hit by a second baseman with 377. He has 1,518 career RBIs, 47 triples, and 560 doubles - with a .500 slugging percentage, .356 career on-base percentage, and scored 1,320 runs in his 17-season career.
A Golden Bear for life, Kent started at shortstop for Cal in his time at Berkeley, was a member of the 1988 College World Series team, and set the single-season record for doubles with 25 as a freshman, a record for the school held for 11 seasons. Kent started the Women Drive Fund with his wife, Dana, in 1998, which saw $500 donated to Cal softball for each RBI he drove in, and matched by corporate matching funds, raising more than $115,000 toward team scholarships in the first year, with more than $600,000 raised during his six seasons with the San Francisco Giants. This then sparked the two of them donating $531,000 in 2014, with an additional $100,000 in matched donations to the California Women’s Softball program, creating a fully endowed scholarship program within Cal Athletics (ESPN/AP).
In 2006, Cal Baseball’s Evans Diamond, one of the most unique stadiums in the nation since 1933, received a renovation project that created the Carl J. Van Heuit Training Facility, a new patio seating area, and a grass bank by left field. While the Carl J. Van Heuit Training Center was named after a Cal Football alum and Cal Baseball fan, it was Jeff Kent who was honored and recognized on the Cal Baseball batting cages, which are officially called the “Jeff Kent Batting Cages.”
Was hoping to see this post! Played for both the Dodgers and Giants so can bridge both fanbases. Go Bears!
Long overdue but the sportswriters snubbed him for 10 years because Kent was too much of an individual and didn’t kiss their collective back sides……Great player. Great thinker at the plate and in the field. Great clutch hitter (rbi guy). Intense competitor. No performance enhancing stuff. Honest/straight shooter. Played for the great Bob Milano, who he just credited in an interview with impressing on him the importance of focusing on just making hard contact and RBI’s……lessons lost on virtually all current MLB players, who go for the HRs with ridiculous launch angle (uppercut) swings. A great representative of baseball, family and Cal. Go Bears!!!