"The key difference here is that in the MLB it's much harder to quantify skills whereas that's not the case with software engineers. If I was part of a team tha

"The key difference here is that in the MLB it's much harder to quantify skills whereas that's not the case with software engineers. If I was part of a team that released a solid piece of software, even if it's from a non-giant software company, I'm not entirely sure why my experience isn't transferable to Google (outside of a different stack)." I'm sorry but that is completely the opposite. In MLB and a lot of other sports now, every single play is tracked. Every player has rate and counting stats to measure efficiency and overall production in every category. Anyone in the world can subscribe to the tape library and watch your entire career on loop and analyze every single moment of your professional career. No one can do anything like that in closed-source software. Infact, that is the big unsolved problem in tech hiring. No one can tell who the good devs are because your "track record", your resume is just not a reliable indicator of your ability.