By Brian Becker
I was recruiting players for Perfectos Jr Babe one afternoon while watching a jr hi baseball game when I first saw Patrick Liddell. He was catching the game. It was clear he hadn't had much training at the position, but he made up for technique with pure heart and hustle.
I quickly found his family and discovered that Patrick had never played baseball before practice had started the previous month.
I was looking at raw talent and it was impressive. Of course I signed him to our Jr Babe Perfectos and got him connected with catching coach Jason Gwin (Assistant Coach at Three Rivers Softball) to begin to learn catching techniques.
On May 6, at our local Pitch Hit & Run contest, Patrick had the fastest 13-14 year old Run which won him the opportunity to move on to sectionals.
At PH&R sectionals in Farmington, Patrick scored the highest among the competitors, winning first place and the opportunity to compete at the St Louis Cardinals Team Championships at Busch Stadium.
On the morning of June 2nd, Patrick competed against other sectional winners across Cardinal country. Patrick hit the ball 202 ft off a tee*, threw 4 strikes out of 6 pitches and ran from second base to home plate in 7.7 seconds.
After officials totaled his score, Patrick Liddell had won first place in the St Louis Cardinals Team Championships for 13-14 year olds.
Once all 32 MLB team competitions have been completed, they will announce the top qualifiers who get to compete in the national Pitch Hit & Run skills competition during All Star Week hosted by the Washington Nationals.
Congratulations Patrick! If you can win the St Louis Cardinal's Team Pitch Hit & Run after only 3 months of playing baseball, you have a great career ahead of you. You are SOMETHING SPECIAL!
Remember that name, folks: Patrick Liddell.
*hitting distance is calculated by taking the total distance the ball traveled on the first bounce and subtracting the distance that bounce is from a line drive straight over 2nd base. So a ball hit 300 feet but 75 feet off of that centerline will be scored as 225 ft.