#MLBVideos: Jeff Kent is elected to Baseball Hall of Fame as part of Class of 2026! (Announcement & interview!)

Jeff Kent is elected to Baseball Hall of Fame as part of Class of 2026! (Announcement & interview!)

On behalf of Hall of Fame Chairman Jane Forbes Clark, our board of directors, and the contemporary baseball era committee that convened earlier today, it is time to reveal the results of this election. Today marks the first announcement to determine who will comprise the Hall of Fame’s class of 2026 with the Baseball Writers Association of America casting their ballots throughout the month of December. The results of that process will also be revealed here on MLB Network live on January 20th from Coopertown, New York at six o’clock Eastern time. And as you saw, the contemporary baseball era voting committee was comprised of historians and longtime writers Steve Hurt, Jason Stark, and Tyler Keaptainner, respected baseball executives Mark Atonio, Doug Melvin, Arty Moreno, Kim Ang, Tony Rigans, and Terry Ryan, and a group of Hall of Famers, Ferguson Jenkins, Jim Cot, Juan Marishell, Tony Perez, Azie Smith, Alan Traml, and Robin Y. Earlier today, that 16 member committee reviews reviewed a distinguished group of eight players whose primary contributions to the game began after 1980. In arriving at their individual decisions, the electors took into consideration the following criteria: the players record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character, and contributions to the game. As you mentioned, the eight candidates on the ballot included Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Carlos Delgado, Jeff Kent, Don Maddingley, Dale Murphy, Gary Sheffield, and Fernando Valenuela. And now, it is my honor to reveal whether any of these candidates will be celebrated in Coopertown next July 26th when the Hall of Fame induction ceremony seen here on Mo takes place. The Contemporary Baseball Era Committee has selected one new member to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. He played 17 seasons with the Blue Jays, the Mets, the Indians, the Giants, the Astros, and the Dodgers, retiring as the all-time leader in home runs as a second baseman with 351 of his 377 career long balls coming at that position. Today, Jeff Kent becomes a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame’s class of 2026. A lifetime 290 hitter with an 855 OPS, he notched 2461 hits, including 560 doubles, good for 30th all time and the third most among all players during his career. During a 9-year stretch from 1997 to 2005, he averaged 28 homers and 110 runs batted in and registered eight 100 RBI seasons, five all-star appearances, and four Silver Slugger awards. He was named the National League’s most valuable player in 2000 when he batted 334 with 33 homer, 125 RBI, and 114 runs scored for the Giants. In 2002, he helped lead San Francisco to the NL pennant and went on to slug three homers in the World Series against the Angels. Jeff Kent, welcome to Coopertown. Wow, breaking news here uh live on MLB Network. Uh it just feels right that the guy with the most home runs ever at a position would be in the Hall of Fame. Uh you mentioned the fan bases uh the uniforms he played for. There’s got to be massive celebration right now in San Francisco, right? Yeah, quite obviously. Um for him, we just got a chance to talk to him shortly before that and it was an emotional moment for him and his family and you can imagine fans in all of those cities are going to be making their way to Coopertown. They’re excited. He really was quite obviously one of one of if not the best offensive second baseman in the history of the game. And now he’s part of the best team ever, the Hall of Fame team. Wow. Jeff Kent elected to the Hall of Fame via the Contemporary Baseball Error Committee. You needed 12 votes. He got 14. Carlos Delgado was three short. He came the closest. Don Mattingley, Dale Murphy each with six. Guys with fewer than five. Bonds, Clemens, Sheffield, and Fernando. That is significant. We’ll talk about that in a second. But let’s discuss the breaking news. Kent to Coopertown. Brian Kenny star of MLB now. Uh obviously he’s the MC of ceremonies each induction ceremony Sunday in Coopertown. Kind enough to join us here for our initial reaction to this news. Jeff Kent elected into the hall. Let me first deal with just Jeff Kent because there’s there are other things clearly on the ballot to address. But Jeff Kent was a victim of the saber metric era. If Jeff Kent had retired in the 80s, he probably sails into the Hall of Fame from the writers. So I think this is just do. You know how I love having an objective methodology for Hall of Fame, but war is not the beall and endall. and he was hurt by his defensive metrics. I think he is above the Hall of Fame line, leading home run hitter at second base for his position. Beat Barry Bond straight up for an MVP and deserved it when Barry was Super Barry. This was a great player. So just that alone, that’s a that in and of itself, that’s an excellent addition, I believe, from the Veterans Committee for the Hall of Fame. The rest I have issues with. This I don’t. Well, I voted for him every year when he was on the writer ballot, and I thought it was the most egregious oversight by the writers over these 10 years he was on the ballot. Most home runs by any second baseman in baseball history. Most 100 RBI seasons any second baseman in history. The highest OPS in the postseason of any second baseman in history. This guy is a Hall of Famer because as a manager, you wanted him up there with runners on base. 290 career hitter with runners in scoring position. Hit 300 and slugged 500. the only middle infielder in the expansion era to do that, a clutch hitter when it counted the most. And he gave managers a big edge. You know this, Cliff, when you have a second baseman who hits like a corner infielder or corner outfielder, you have a huge advantage. Can I jump off that for a second, Cliff? Just to jump in that right, we did get used to bigger, more slugging second baseman when these shift restrictions came in. But while he was playing and really throughout the history of baseball, second baseman didn’t slug. He was a slugging second baseman. Well, he was really clutch. You’re right. And I think that was the biggest thing, Tom. You make a great point because when he came over to the plate, it was like, “Oh, boy.” You knew he was going to come through. And I think the one third word that gets thrown out too much in our game is consistency. Well, he was consistent every year, year in and year out. Yeah. The power kind of went up later on as he bounced around. And and I’m I’m I’m really want to ask him what happened, what changed as far as his power because his stance never changed. He he looked the same. it was straight up and then he just had pop to all, you know, uh, parts of the field. I think the biggest thing with me, I don’t think you question him going to Hall of Fame. I just look at, you know, some of the guys on the list. I look at, you know, we we’ve done on your show, Lou Whitaker, you know, and you talk about Warren, some of these other things. Congrat Congratulations to Jeff Kent. I just look at it from a standpoint of, you know, he’s deserving when you look at these numbers across the board. Jeff Kent makes sense. If you have the most home runs at a position in baseball history and you’re durable at the position, I mean, he’s played how many seasons did he play at second base? I think only nine other guys played more games at second base than Jeff Kent. Yeah, there’s only 10 second baseman in history who played more games at second Jeff Kent. So, don’t tell me about his defense because managers do not give away starting jobs. He played on seven teams that went for the postseason. They were very comfortable with him playing second base over 17, 18, 19 years in the big leagues. Yeah. And when you consider that there were former players on this committee, Cliff, this is a guy you competed against. Yeah. Saw it a lot. You saw him a lot. Beat us a lot. Did you Did you think when you competed against Jeff Kent, you were facing a Hall of Famer? You know, when you start, if you look back on it, you can say, you know, certain dudes have that it factor. the guys that you know, you know, are gonna take advantage of being in line with Barry Bonds, gonna take advantage of being, you know, a guy that can consistently go out there and get the job done. I just I just go back to when you when you look in these, you know, in these clubouses, man, it’s you’re hardressed to find a guy that plays second base that hit 377 homers, right? And so when you do that, it’s like, well, how could you not, you know, how could you not be going to the Hall of Fame with those type of numbers? So, uh, Jeff Kent is going to be joining us soon, and we’re excited to talk to Jeff Kent after the biggest news ever for him. But BK, you’re you’re like this dog at a dog park that I’m about to let off the the leash. Go right ahead. Off. Is that is that how it should be? Your take off. Your take on what we saw in terms of the other candidates that could have been voted for. Look, I I know the process is the process and you don’t want to just open the floodgates. You need to have a certain level of exclusivity. I have never understood, and this is going back years and years when they were on the ballot, just as I never understood, hey, the writers, the voters, they’re missing a hell of a ball game, that they don’t think Fred Mcgriff is a Hall of Famer. And I said it like three years ago, you can vote McGriff, Matting Lee, and Murphy and feel good about it and have a glorious day in the summertime feeling good about all that is good about baseball and not vote for the steroid guys or other guys who have behavior that you have to excuse. So Mattingley and Murphy were the best players in their leagues for several years at different points, the best players in all of baseball. There are very few guys walking the planet that ever did that. And they are exemplary sportsmen, the standard by which we measure other ball players. So, you know, I’m more of a peak, you know, voter. Uh I go Don Mattingley and Dale Murphy for me, I thought this was an excellent year to get them in as well. That said, we’re all very excited for Jeff Kent, newly elected off this contemporary era ballot. And Jeff Kent kind enough to join us live on MLB tonight. Jeff, congratulations on this massive day for you. Can you walk us through the emotions the the moment that phone rang and you got the call? Well, I’ve used all my cry rags already, so I I don’t have any more. The uh the emotions are overwhelming. Uh unbelievable. didn’t even expect it uh for me. You know, there’s so many quality guys. Murf, Murf for sure, Matting Lee, another quality guy. A lot of guys that the committee had to argue through and and and vote for and, you know, grateful that they considered me and you know, gave it a shot for uh for putting me in. Well, Jeff, congratulations, especially. It’s been a long time coming. I know it’s welld deserved. Now, we rattled off the teams you played for, and I know the Hall of Fame has the final say, but in your mind, is there a certain hat that you would like to wear on the cap? One team that you think you’re most representative of? Well, you know, the the the turning point in my career was with Dusty Baker. Uh the manager that I got with in San Francisco, uh he was a uh he was a hitting coach. You know, he really motivated me to uh to to to to get the peak performance out of me. That was a place that I started to learn how to go the other way. Uh- w he told me if I started to go the other way in that gap that was in Candlestick that my batting average would start to go up. So, I was a dead pole hitter when young in my career and then I started to turn it around in San Francisco and you know the going to the World Series with San Francisco. I hate to say it, game seven loser in San Francisco in the World Series, but so many great moments uh in the Bay Area with those fans. opened a new ballpark. Uh just just a phenomenal place to play uh for me in my career and I went to college up at Berkeley too. So it was a it was a place that I was familiar with. Hey Jeff, congratulations man. You know I’m going to go back to 9798. It was a uptick in your homers where you just consistently starting the ball at the ballpark a little bit more. What kind of changed? Because as as as a guy going against you, you did go foul pole to foul pole, but it was just like different off the bat. Uh what what changed in those years? Uh I choked up on the bat about a half an inch and got more bat control. And uh some of that had to do with the fact that I was I always wanted to be in the middle of the lineup in a pressure situation. I wanted to be a run producer. You know, that’s what they were paying guys to do back in the day, too, is producing runs, driving in runs, you know, getting that Eddie Eddie Murphy Eddie Murray, sorry. Eddie Eddie Murray used to tell me all the time, you got bases loaded, don’t worry about getting them all in. Just get that one run in. And that and so I had to concentrate on just getting that one run. And I couldn’t swing and miss. I was tired of swinging and missing. So, I choked up on the bat a little bit, started to go the other way. The wind and candlestick was swirling all the time and that helped me a little bit. But, uh, that’s that’s the that’s the real moment that my career, my batting started to turn was just choking up on that bat. Just grabbing a little more bat head control with about a half inch of bat now on a and I swung a 34 inch bat and didn’t swung a wide ash Louisville slugger bat. Nothing big. Uh, but it was just just grabbing that extra, you know, quarter inch/ inch on that bat on that knob that uh, you know, gained me better bat control. Jeff, it’s Brian Kenny. Congratulations to you. Welld deserved as everyone on the panel here believes as well. H Have you It is an awesome sight when you look at the stage and you see all the Hall of Famers up there, 50 to 60 of them sitting there living history of baseball. Have you thought about joining that group and being up on that stage? No, I haven’t thought about it. I I h I’m I’m I’m in Texas with family and friends uh hunting uh working cows and and enjoying the 80 degree weather out here in Texas right now. So, you know, I gave no thought to it. I’m wearing holy jeans and dirty boots and uh just having a good time out here with my grandkids. So, no, this is overwhelming. Just overwhelming. Well, it’s only begun. So, give it some thought. It’s happening. Congratulations to you. Thank you, brother. Appreciate it. Yes. And before we let you go, Yeah. Before we let you go, Jeeoff, we see the emotion. Um, you know, on the BBWA ballot, you never reached the 50% in terms of support. Um, describe why this is emotional for you this day. Yeah. You know, I I don’t know. It’s it’s it’s a uh it’s it’s a moment of um of of of satisfaction of the uh the things that I did right in my career, the things that I consistently uh uh stuck to, the the hard work, the uh the the the the gratification that you get from playing the the game the right way. And and I love the game. I I love the game. I still do. And a lot of these emotions that are going through me right now is is bringing is is bringing that game back. It’s been a while since I played. It’s been a while since I fought on the field with with opponents and and tried to win and take things from people, but you know, all that’s come it’s come rushing back in the last half an hour and it’s uh it’s been overwhelming. Jeff Kent, we are so happy for you. This is going to be months now to celebrate your incredible baseball career. Enjoy this moment with your family. Okay, Jeeoff. Yeah, thank you guys. I appreciate it. Thank you for uh thank you for always arguing for me and about me and uh and and keeping that conversation hot and you know, thank you for what you guys do for baseball. This is this is you know, it’s I wish Murf was there. Mattingly, I knew Matting Lee as a coach, too. Didn’t watch him much as a player because he was older than I was. But you know what a what an overwhelming moment this is to to be among some great players and great players that still need to be considered to go into the Hall of Fame, too.

Josh Rawitch announces on @MLBNetwork that Jeff Kent was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Kent joins MLB Tonight to discuss his career and being elected as the first member of the Class of 2026. Reaction to the vote is shared afterwards.

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