Seeking HOF push, Kent played game ‘right way’

NEW YORK — After Jeff Kent retired from baseball in 2008, Dusty Baker — his manager for six years when both were with the Giants — approached him and said, “I expect you to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.”

One could understand why Baker thinks highly of Kent. A five-time All-Star, Kent hit 377 career home runs, and is the only second baseman to have six consecutive seasons with 100 or more RBIs. (He reached the mark eight separate times). His .290 career batting average is higher than Hall of Famers such as Ryne Sandberg and Joe Morgan.

And who can forget Kent’s best season, which occurred in 2000? He won the National League MVP after hitting .334/.424/.596 with 33 home runs and 125 RBIs. He also posted a 7.2 WAR, per Baseball-Reference.com, that year.

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Kent played for six teams during his 17-year career, and most of his success came with the Giants. During his six years in San Francisco, Kent and Barry Bonds were a powerful 1-2 punch in the middle of the Giants’ lineup.

“It’s what you see is what you get when you talk about Jeff Kent,” said Baker, who now manages the Nationals. “There is nothing phony about him. I enjoyed having him on the team. He played hard for me. Jeff Kent, he is the man.”

Kent may be “the man” in Baker’s eyes, but the Baseball Writers’ Association of America sees him differently. Since becoming eligible for the Hall of Fame in 2014, Kent hasn’t come close to the 75 percent of votes needed for induction. In his first year of eligibility, Kent received 15.2 percent of the vote. In 2015, he fell to 14 percent of the …

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