http://royals.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/kc/...ews&team_id=kc
News
12/21/2001 12:54 pm ET
Â* Â* Â* Â*
Where have you gone Freddie Patek?
By Robert Falkoff
MLB.com
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - To the baby boomers who fondly recall baseball in the late 1960s and 1970s, Fred Patek is still the little man who can.
How many short people from that era looked at this 5-foot-4 ball of fire and dared to dream big?Â* How many short people from that era were inspired to see the diminutive shortstop overcome his lack of size with big-time talent and a big-time heart?
What Spud Webb and Muggsy Bogues have been to pro basketball in more recent times, that's what Patek was to Major League Baseball more than two decades back.
"I guess I didn't really realize the impact of it all when I was playing," said Patek, a 14-year Major League veteran who earned a place in the Kansas City Royals' Hall of Fame. "But then you start answering a lot of those letters from moms and dads who say 'my son is really small, but loves to play sports. Do you have any words of advice?'"
Patek, who has made his home in Kansas City for three decades, answers the letters and makes the phone calls. The overriding message: Follow your dreams and never listen to people who say you can't make athletically strictly because of a lack of size.
"I heard that all my life, from age 3 or 4," said Patek. "But I had a passion for baseball. I ate, slept and dreamed it. God blessed me with an unbelievable amount of talent for someone my size. I've really been fortunate.
"When you hear someone say you can't, I think there's an internal drive that kicks in. You just want to prove them wrong."
Â* Â*
"I had a passion for baseball. I ate, slept and dreamed it. God blessed me with an unbelievable amount of talent for someone my size. I've really been fortunate."
-- FRED PATEKÂ* Â*
Â* Â*
Patek, 58, played for the Pirates,Â* Royals and Angels from 1968 through 1981. Indeed, he proved them wrong. He was a cornerstone of the Royals' success in the 1970s, earning a pair of All-Star game selections and helping Kansas City reach the playoffs in 1976, '77 and '78. Only the New York Yankees stood between Patek and the World Series.
"If we had gotten (reliever) Goose Gossage instead of the Yankees for the $600,000 or so that it took back then, we might have been the dominant team instead of New York," Patek said.
Patek was smooth and sure at shortstop and had a strong arm. During a recent gathering of some 1976 Royals, Manager Whitey Herzog said Patek was the best "carpet" shortstop he ever had. High praise indeed, considering that Herzog had a guy named Ozzie Smith in St. Louis who spent some time playing on artificial surfaces..
"I thought my mouth was going to hit the floor when Whitey said that," Patek said. "To me, it was definitely harder to play on artificial surface. You had to cover a lot more ground. Later in my career, when I played on natural grass, I just said 'wow, how much easier is this?'"
Cornerstone of Royals success
Baseball analyst Bill James recently ranked Patek as the 14th best player in Royals' history. From 1971 through 1979, he hit .241 in 1,245 games. He led the American League with 11 triples in 1971 and with 53 stolen bases in 1977.
Patek made it to the Big Leagues with Pittsburgh and his career blossomed when he was traded to Kansas City.
"If I had been with Pittsburgh another year or so, I probably would have been out," Patek said. "They were trying to get me to be a utility player. I'm not sure someone my size would have stayed around long as a utility player. The trade came at a perfect time because the Royals were just a couple of years in as an expansion club and they gave me the opportunity to play every day. God put me in the right place at the right time. I know where it all comes from."
Strength through faith
Patek is a deeply religious man and that faith has fortified him through both triumph and heartache. In 1992, his 19-year-old daughter Kim was involved in an automobile accident and paralyzed from the neck down. She died four years later.
"You look back at things years later and wonder how you got through something like that," Patek said. "You only come up with one answer: God gets you through it. I don't know how that little girl did what she did. She was as active as I was. How do you lay there for four years, being that active, knowing there's nothing you can do or will ever be able to do? I remember a lot of things she and I talked about. That's what I remember a lot now.
"When things were bad, my wife (Jerri) would say 'do you think she'd want to still be living the way she was?' The answer always came up no. She was ready to die. She wanted to. It was time. God knew what he was doing. Words can't really explain it. I just know, for me, what's true."
Grandpa Patek
These days, Patek is a doting grandfather. His oldest daughter, Heather, has two daughters.
"I really enjoy being a fulltime grandpa," Patek said. "I tell people it's the best job I ever had. There's no pay, but the benefits are awesome."
After being released by the Angels in 1981, Patek had a variety of jobs in and out of baseball. He was a baseball commentator and worked in the Ranger and Brewer organizations. He has also been in the restaurant and roofing business.
"My son-and-law and I owned a small guttering and siding company for about two years," Patek said. "We sold that about a year ago. That was pretty hard work. I figured I was too old to be crawling around on roofs."
Patek still follows baseball closely and could be in line to return to the Majors as a coach if a certain person is hired by a certain team to be the general manager.
Improving the game
He has some interesting thoughts on what might make the game better.
When Patek came up in 1968, it was the Year of the Pitcher. Bob Gibson had a remarkable 1.12 earned run average and the mound was lowered after that season.
"I'd like to see them raise the mound back where it was and get the strike zone back where it needs to be," Patek said. "Maybe I'm wrong, but I think people loved the World Series this year. They love the 2-1 and 3-2 games. They like to go to the seventh, eighth and ninth innings with the game on the line. I don't think people are necessarily turned on by the great offensive numbers because I think people realize those numbers are skewed. You have to get back to the 2:20 or 2:30 game. When it goes 3:30 or four hours, I think some fans tend to lose interest."
In this era, you see players who are 5-9, 5-8, maybe 5-7. But 5-4? Think of those dimensions and you think only of Fred Patek.
Some day, maybe another 5-4 player will come along to defy the odds and withstand the test of time in the Major Leagues. Until that day comes, Patek stands apart as baseball's symbol of the little man who can.
Robert Falkoff covers the Royals for MLB.com
Fred Patek played in the Major Leagues from 1968 through 1981.
Linear Mode
