She’s not the Senate race’s baseball star, but some mighty players are backing her

Unlike one of her rivals, Rep. Barbara Lee doesn’t have a built-in Major League fan base helping boost her run for U.S. Senate. But some of the game’s biggest names — Dusty Baker among them — threw their support behind her this week as she faces difficult fourth-place polling heading into Tuesday’s primary Election Day.

In addition to the Baker, the toothpick-chewing former manager of the San Francisco Giants, Lee this week announced her campaign is backed by Dave Stewart and Rickey Henderson — team members during the Oakland A’s glory days, and Shooty Babitt and Tye Waller, who also have connections to Lee’s district hometown team, which is planning a move to Las Vegas. Baker and Stewart are former Los Angeles Dodgers teammates of Steve Garvey, one of Lee’s rivals in the Senate race who has rocketed past her in the polls since joining the contest in October.

“Barbara Lee has always fought the good fight to keep all Americans safe and protect our civil liberties, to keep our country moving forward in the right direction,” said Stewart, who pitched on World Series winning teams for the Dodgers in 1981, the A’s in 1989 and the Blue Jays in 1993. He was teammates with Garvey on that 1981 World Series winning team in LA.

Garvey, a first baseman for the Dodgers and the San Diego Padres over a major league career from 1969 to 1987 in which he was a 10-time All Star, four-time Gold Glover and 1974 National League MVP, has said the endorsements that matter most to him are from public safety first-responders. His supporters include the San Diego Police Officers Association and El Monte Police Officers Association.

Garvey has criticized the Democratic members of Congress in the race — Reps. Adam Schiff of Burbank, Katie Porter of Irvine and Lee — for problems with the border, housing costs, homelessness and crime that have worsened under their watch. Lee has been in Congress since 1998, Schiff since 2001 and Porter since 2018.

Polls have consistently put Lee in fourth place behind Schiff, Garvey and Porter, and a new poll out Friday put Garvey in front of the pack as he consolidates the votes of Republicans and independents frustrated with the state’s problems.

Lee will attend a campaign event Saturday in San Diego with Waller, a former MLB third baseman and an A’s coach from 2007 to 2015.

Baker, a two-time World Series champion as both a player and manager, played in MLB from 1968 to 1986 for the Atlanta Braves, Dodgers, San Francisco Giants and A’s. He went on to manage the Giants, Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Reds, Washington Nationals and Houston Astros, and now is an advisor to the Giants.

Henderson, also a two-time World Series champion, was an outfielder in the majors from 1979 to 2003 in which he was a 10-time all star and set career and single-season stolen base records.

Babbitt played as an infielder for the A’s in 1981 and went on to become a scout and TV analyst.

Schiff, who has led the race in fundraising and polling and was in a statistical tie with Garvey in Friday’s poll, has the endorsement of Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the former House Speaker; former U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer; and more than 300 other California elected officials including 80% of the state’s Democratic congressional delegation. He also is backed by 18 statewide labor unions.

Porter is endorsed by U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, California Rep. Robert Garcia, state Attorney General Rob Bonta and several state lawmakers including Sen. Scott Wiener of San Francisco and Assembly members Buffy Wicks of Oakland and Alex Lee of Milpitas, as well as the California Labor Federation and Consumer Federation of California.