The SF Giants gave Jeff Kent his long-overdue moment last weekend, retiring No. 21 in a ceremony that fit the occasion. But the Hall of Fame second baseman didn’t just take the applause and move on. He used his time with the media to unload on the modern game, and by extension, he ended up taking a shot at the very kind of roster Buster Posey has built in San Francisco.
Kent’s most pointed comments came when he was asked about baseball today and how it has changed. He launched into a three and a half minute answer that included this line:
“I hope that there’s patience with Buster Posey because it’s gonna be an uphill battle to change the dynamic of the evolution of the game that has gone the wrong way… Too many smart people have created WARs and statistics of, you know, the shift…That’s taken away from the game itself… Run production is now a .240 batting average and driving in 76 runs and you get paid $20 million. I don’t freaking get that.”
That’s classic retired-player frustration, the kind that shows up every time a former star looks at today’s sport and decides it’s lost something. Kent clearly isn’t sold on how much analytics shape the game now. He did concede that they have a place, just not as much of one as they do in the current era.
The awkward part for him is that the Giants’ own roster construction looks a lot like the world he was criticizing. Posey’s core is built around players who don’t exactly fit the old-school batting-average-and-RBI mold Kent was defending.
Matt Chapman and Willy Adames are the clearest examples. In three seasons with San Francisco, Chapman has hit .239/.331/.430 with 55 homers and 181 runs batted in.
Adames, over two seasons, has hit .227/.306/.422 with 51 homers and 131 runs batted in. Chapman is making roughly $25 million per year, while Adames is making roughly $31 million per year.
Rafael Devers stands apart a bit because he is the best hitter of the group and brings more slug than the other two, but his numbers still fit the broader theme. Last season, he hit .236/.347/.460 with 20 homers and 51 RBI for the Giants.
This year, he’s hit .252/.334/.497 with 32 homers and 83 runs batted in. He’s making $28.5 million per year.
Together, those three players make up most of San Francisco’s payroll, and none of them is likely to spend much time above .250 during their Giants tenure. That’s not an accident. It reflects the way the sport now values production, with front offices caring far more about WAR, OPS, and wRC+ than the old benchmarks Kent invoked.
Kent’s famous line has always been, “The money lies in the RBIs,” but that’s not really how the industry works anymore. These days, it’s closer to, “You will make more with a high WAR,” or, “Front offices are impressed by your OPS,” or maybe, “Your bank account will be robust if you have a high wRC+.”
Posey may not have Farhan Zaidi’s exact analytical lean, but the Giants are still operating in the same broad baseball economy as everyone else. That’s why they poured money into Chapman, Adames, and Devers, while Luis Arraez landed for just $12 million even though he very well could win another batting title.
The Giants entered the year with a lineup that looked strong on paper, and there was at least a sense they were trying to bridge two different baseball philosophies. Devers brought the big-money, modern-profile production. Arraez and Jung Hoo Lee offered the contact-heavy style that can still put a batting average above .300 on the board.
It didn’t work out the way the Giants hoped. And if Kent expects Posey to reverse the direction of the modern game, he’s probably going to be waiting a while. San Francisco has already committed too much money to the kind of players Kent sees as overpaid.
He can object to what front offices value now compared with his own era. That’s fair enough. But for now, this is the game as it exists, and there’s not much reason to think it’s changing anytime soon.
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