Veteran presence

From Wiki Gonzalez

Veteran presence describes the intangibles belonging to an over-the-hill veteran player; in particular, those qualities baseball teams signing such a player expect from him beyond his on-the-field performance.

Signing vets for their "veteran presence" is a practice that old-time baseball men consider common sense, but many sabermetric analysts suspect as being a cover for sloppy or cliched thinking: bringing in an unproductive player for his name value or memories of past heroics, while blocking a less-heralded more productive player from a chance to play.

Veteran Presence™ is an evergreen topic for quips and ridicule on BTF, but the question of whether to "play the kids" or "go for it all now with the vets" is still an unanswered one in baseball front offices and in sabermetrics, but Dusty Baker does not see it to be an issue.