Brandon Crawford, the Pleasanton kid who grew up to be the San Francisco Giants’ everyday shortstop, is getting a formal Bay Area sports coronation. Tomorrow, he will be enshrined in the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame at the Hyatt Regency Embarcadero, a fitting capstone for a career that rarely strayed far from home.
Crawford spent 13 seasons as the Giants’ starting shortstop before finishing his last big-league year in St. Louis and announcing his retirement after the 2024 campaign. For Bay Area fans, Thursday’s ceremony lands less like a curtain call and more like a neighborhood reunion, tying together his Little League beginnings, a pile of defensive hardware, and two World Series rings.
The Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame named its 2026 class as Jack Clark, Missy Franklin, Eddie Hart, Jesse Sapolu and Crawford, with an enshrinement dinner set for tomorrow at the Hyatt Regency Embarcadero, according to the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame. The organization noted that a portion of the event’s proceeds will benefit Special Olympics Northern California and, in its announcement, leaned into Crawford’s local roots and long list of honors.
Ceremony and hometown welcome
Giants infield coach Ron Wotus will do the honors of introducing Crawford at the ceremony. Wotus summed up Crawford’s on-field presence in one tidy line: “Brandon stabilized the whole infield.” That assessment, along with details about Crawford’s family being a regular sight at Oracle Park over the years, was reported by the San Francisco Chronicle…