Jason Kipnis played ten seasons in the Majors, nine with Cleveland, where he was twice an All-Star. The Second Baseman never broached elite status, but the Indians had a solid starter who had 1,146 Hits and 126 Home Runs over his career.
Hunter Pence broke in with the Houston Astros in 2007, finishing third in National League Rookie of the Year voting displaying a nice balance of power and average that would be his calling card.
Settling in at Rightfield, Pence was an All-Star in 2009 and 2011, hitting 20 Home Runs six years in a row beginning in 2008 while batting over .300 twice. Traded to the Phillies during the 2011 Season and subsequently to San Francisco the following year. It was as a Giant that Pence achieved his greatest fame.
This happened not necessarily because Pence was a better player but rather that he joined a loaded Giants team that won the 2012 World Series and again in 2014. Pence was still a solid contributor, even having his best season in '14, where he was an All-Star for the third time and was eleventh in MVP voting, his highest finish. He slowed down after, though he added an All-Star as Texas' Designated Hitter in 2019, Pence's only year there. He returned to the Bay Area for one final year but was released midseason.
Pence might not have been a superstar, but he had a career that is the envy of many.
Howie Kendrick played 15 years in the Majors, the first nine of which with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, where the Second Baseman was an All-Star in 2011. Kendrick had several good offensive years for the Halos, batting 2.92 overall for Los Angeles, with 1,204 of his 1,747 Hits collected there.
While he declined in 2015, he still was productive, playing for the Dodgers and Phillies, and lastly, the Washington Nationals, where he helped them win the 2019 World Series, winning his last major award, the NLCS MVP.
Despite being a First Round Pick, Gio Gonzalez was traded three times before he made his Major League debut, which was with Oakland in 2008. Gonzalez's first two years were nothing special, but he broke out in 2010, going 15-9 with a 3.23 ERA, and he was better in 2011, going to the All-Star Game and finishing the year at 16-12 with a 3.12 ERA. As typical with the A's, Gonzalez was traded away, as Oakland knew they could not afford him in the future. The Washington Nationals would become their long-term home for Gonzalez.
In Gonzalez's first year in the National League, he had the best year of his career, leading the league in Wins (21), adding a second All-Star Game, while also finishing first in FIP (2.82) and SO/9 (9.3) and fanning 203 batters. Gonzalez was third in Cy Young voting, but this would be his highwater mark, not a building block. Over the next five years, Gonzalez mainly was a middle-of-the-road starter, though he was sixth in Cy Young voting in 2017 when he was 15-9 and had a 2.96 ERA.
Gonzalez was traded to Milwaukee during the 2018 Season, but he declined the following year and battled with injuries. After a year with the White Sox and an attempted comeback with Miami in 2021, his career ended with a decent record of 131-101 and 1,860 Strikeouts.