LaTroy Hawkins and Pat Mahomes: A Bond Brought Together Through Baseball

[Sherry Cerny]

Baseball transcends beyond the field. It speaks a language felt by players and fans alike. It brings people together, sometimes from very different walks of life. Baseball can bring fans together, in a community like Twins Daily. The players  have a special bond, a Baseball Brotherhood, that no one but them will ever understand. For Patrick Mahomes and Latroy Hawkins, baseball gave them a life-long friendship. 

Recently, I had the privilege of sitting down with former Twins pitchers Pat Mahomes and Latroy Hawkins to talk about their thirty-year friendship. I was all set with my pen, notes, and questions, and was anxiously contemplating how I was going to ask them. However, I found that I didn't need questions at all. The conversation took a fantastic direction, and I was just a spectator listening to the story of their friendship journey. Baseball provided the catalyst. 

Pat Mahomes was the Twins sixth-round draft pick out of high school in 1988 and started his professional career in the Twins Rookie League at 17 years old. He came from the small town of Lindale, Texas, in the northeast part of the state. At that time, there were only maybe 2,000 people, and almost none of them were white. 

When he arrived in Elizabethton, Tennessee, to start his career, several teammates told Pat that all the black people lived on a hill in the Appalachian Mountains. Pat refused to go up in the mountains, he didn’t believe he needed to. 

He knew that he was in the minority, but he refused to let his race determine his place in society or on the baseball team. Pat was not afraid to speak his mind. He didn’t put him into a specific category or let anyone else do it either. He got an apartment in the next city over with one of the first-rounders on the team, and they drove in every day for practice and games. They split rent and gas and lived on $700 per month salaries. 

LaTroy Hawkins was raised in the much larger city of Gary, Indiana. However, the demographics of Gary were the same as Lindale, nearly 100% black. 

Hawkins was the Twins seventh-round draft pick in 1991, also out of high school. LaTroy said he wasn't 'treated' a certain way by any of the Twins players, but when he arrived at Fort Myers after the draft and for spring training in 1992, he said the culture shock was looking at people who didn't look like him. It was a whole new world because there were no white kids where he lived and went to school. 

Mahomes said he had been with the Twins for a few seasons when LaTroy, Jacque Jones, and Torii Hunter showed up to minor league spring training. He knew as a black player what they were about to go through, the same adjustment he went through when he came to camp. Pat took them all out to eat to help them get acquainted and feel comfortable. Maybe even just to let them know that they weren’t alone.  

The truth was that Pat “didn't have anyone there for him when he came to the organization”, and he wanted to be there for the next generation. They never felt like they were 'outsiders' with any group they associated with: Whites, Blacks, Dominicans, and Pat and LaTroy weren't afraid to get out of their comfort zone. The group of them together loved to talk and engage with other players from other places or countries, pushing others to communicate and engage. Eventually, with their determination to show the players it's good to get outside their comfort zone, Pat and LaTroy became the glue that sealed the groups and team together. They believe their ability to adapt and have confidence in their craft and person made them successful during their careers.

Pat and LaTroy didn't spend a lot of time together on the field, a total of two-and-half seasons collectively. Both players were in big-league spring training in 1992 for the Minnesota Twins, and then Pat got called up to the Major Leagues in April. He was the only rookie pitcher that season on the 40-man.roster 

Pat may have left LaTroy in the minors, but not the friendship. While in the majors, Pat read scouting reports and newspapers on who was up and coming in the organization. Some baseball players pay close attention to the prospects coming up because they are playing for their careers. Pat saw LaTroy's name come up in reports all the time, and he knew he was coming soon. He wasn’t worried about his job; Pat knew they had a special connection, and he was eager to see the rookie doing so well and on the move. 

Mahomes was living with Scott Erickson in 1995. Erickson got traded halfway through the season, leaving Pat heartbroken. However, the trade made way for Hawkins to come up to the Major Leagues. 

When a player is traded, league rules required that the team cover rent and continued to do so after Erickson left. So when Pat called LaTroy to congratulate him, he knew he was pitching the next day and invited him to come to live with him (rent-free). That was the beginning of the strongest friendships brought on by baseball. Pat looked out for LaTroy. He always had his back, whether walking into the minors or starting his first game in the big leagues. 

The relationship isn't one-sided. It runs both ways. The two men could not be farther apart in personality. Pat attributes a lot of his 'grounding' to LaTroy. Pat was the "Wild Child," unafraid to speak his mind when he thought it was warranted. LaTroy, on the other hand, as Pat says, is "a little more professional. A solid guy." They have a good balance in their relationship. One is a little less, the other is a little more, and vice versa. It just depends on the situation. That translates on and off the field.

Pat said, "LaTroy was always confident. He never looked like he didn't belong there." 

If either was pitching and the game was not going the way they wanted, there was no need for alarm. However, if their poise or composure looked out of the ordinary, that's when they would pick up the phone and say, "Okay. What's going on?" 

No pep talks. No advice. They tell each other what they see. They don't fight. Being blunt and honest keeps it that way. Sure, they may get upset at the other's observation, but that's what family does. 

Their bond is a lot like brothers, like family. They are each other's keepers. LaTroy confides that while he has blood siblings, there are things that Pat knows that his siblings don't. They look out for each other, and if LaTroy were to call Pat and tell him he needed him, Pat would show up, "No questions asked," LaTroy said, "even if they were going to the moon." 

Their relationship has poured into the next generation. Hawkins was instrumental in raising Mahomes’s first-born son, Patrick Mahomes II. Pat entrusted the care and his son's life to LaTroy, making him his Godfather. 

The three of us giggled as we talked about Patrick's love for ketchup that I had read in an article earlier in the week. They both confirmed that ketchup to Patrick was just as important as family and football. As they reminisce over funny memories, they recalled the time they played winter baseball together in Puerto Rico. Patrick never slept, and since Pat had to pitch the next day, LaTroy took Patrick during the wee hours of the night (or morning) to Burger King to get french fries and "hundreds of packets" of ketchup. 

As Patrick grew up, he got more involved in sports, and they watched him grow and develop. They traveled all over the country, watching him play football, baseball, and basketball. They knew from a young age that Patrick was 'special,' a word they don't use lightly. They knew he would be a professional athlete, but they were not expecting it to take the turn that it did. 

They both paused as Pat told me about his favorite LaTroy Hawkins moment.

It was Patrick’s Super Bowl in 2019, and what it meant to the two of them as friends because it was almost the Super Bowl that never was. 

LaTroy teared up and said, "He did it." 

LaTroy teared up again, hearing the story. It wasn't about the win. It was the fact that collectively they impacted Patrick’s life to where he left his comfort zone and took a chance on himself and was living out the dream neither of them could have ever imagined.

Patrick almost didn't play football. He had been on the baseball scouts' radar for years. He had natural talent as a baseball player, which was well known, but he had a passion for football. 

During his final year of high school, Patrick had agents and Major League teams calling him before the baseball draft. During the draft, sitting in the room waiting to be drafted, he leaned over and looked at his dad and said he didn't want to pursue baseball professionally; he wanted to try football. The Detroit Tigers still drafted the younger Mahomes, but only in the 37th round, knowing that he wouldn’t sign. He was headed to Texas Tech to play quarterback.

Patrick wanted to take a chance on himself and play the game he loved, football, in college. Pat was worried everything he learned wouldn't translate from high school to college, to the NFL. Pat reached out to LaTroy in true family fashion, not out of concern, but confirmation this was a good choice. LaTroy was in Brazil when he got the phone call from Pat and Patrick. When LaTroy answered,

Pat said, "Hey, he doesn't want to play baseball. He wants to play football," and LaTroy said, "Okay." 

That was it. One word, Okay. The trust that if LaTroy says, "Okay," it's going to be okay, and the rest is history. 

History is so abundant with these two I didn't have to ask a single question; Pat and LaTroy just told the story of their friendship. It's a story of two young players that went from watching out for each other on the field to two old(er) friends who would do anything for each other at the drop of a hat, even if it means going to the moon. 
 

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[nclahammer]

What an awesome story of friendship.   Well done.

[mikelink45]

That was really enjoyable.  Very nice presentation.

[Game7-91]

Great story. This is the kind of content that makes TD the best pro sports site there is?

And Patrick Mahomes looks like he has seriously mad baseball chops, got his dad's arm plus some. 

Great story, and video!

[Squirrel]

Thanks, Sherry ... great article!

[jimbo92107]

OMG, young Patrick had at least three good pitches, a heater, a vertical snap curve, and a change that dies off the arm-side corner. He would have been a starter at the mlb level.