(This is a post I made to a baseball forum on June 1, 2008, where the subject was the 1978 Atlanta Braves. One player I remember from that team was Pat Rockett, a shortstop who, well, had a short major-league career. I've had some fascination with players of this type in my baseball fandom life, and decided to do a bit of research about him. This was the post I made, in its entirety, with no editing. Oh, by the way, I used to play a game called "Strat-O-Matic", a company still in existence, still making baseball, football, basketball and hockey games. Perhaps I'll write about that some other day. For now, the "archives" are fun!)

Bill James, Strat and players like Pat Rockett have made baseball fun for me. I feel the need to sate an indulgence. Thank you for letting me have my moment here.

Time for some Pat Rockett stuff and things....

This is from the Atlanta Braves Radio Network website mailbag, where someone asked whatever happened to Pat Rockett. Here is the mailbag reply:

For those who are scratching their heads as to who exactly Pat Rockett was in the annals of Braves history, he was highly touted infielder in the late 70s. Drafted as the tenth overall pick in the first round of the 1973 amatuer draft, Rockett ascended (much pun intendeded) to the majors at the tender age of 21 in 1976. Two rounds after Atlanta selected Rockett, Baltimore took a chance on a high school first baseman by the name of Eddie Murray. Hindsight is of course 20/20. Over parts of three seasons with the Braves, his only Major League club, Rockett batted .214 in 411 career at-bats. He was later dealt to the Blue Jays in 1979 as part of a 5-player deal that brought Chris Chambliss to Atlanta.

To be quite honest, I have no idea what Rockett, now 52, is up to these days. What I can tell you is that his former teammate Biff Pocoroba is currently in the restaurant supply business in the metro-Atlanta area, selling meat for his company "Sausage World." Now that you may not have known.

I had a few 1977 season cards when I was younger (that I had gotten from a friend) and one of them was Pat Rockett. We played a game once where Rockett hit 2 home runs in one game (I was rolling for him) and he ended up getting 4 hits! I used to have some mystical force over players like him back in my heavy Strat-playing days.

Here's his baseball card from 1978, courtesy of Baseball Almanac:



Also, here's an article at a website called Rowland's Office that states what the writer thinks is the worst season ever by an Atlanta Braves shortstop.

And it seems that Pat Rockett holds a record for the Syracuse Chiefs (Toronto Blue Jays) minor league team:

SkyChiefs first baseman Kevin Barker set a modern franchise single game record (1961-present) with six hits against Ottawa on Thursday.

Barker went 6-for-6 with two home runs, two doubles and two singles in the game, which was the completion of Wednesday's suspended game. He broke the single game record of five hits in a game shared by 39 players. Simon Pond was the last player to accomplish the feat, having done so on June 25, 2003 against Charlotte.

Barker also scored five runs in the SkyChiefs' 13-10 victory, tying him with four others (Danny Walton - 6/11/72, Joe Cannon - 6/14/79, Pat Rockett - 6/28/80, and Sil Campusano - 8/25/87) for the modern franchise record. Barker's seven RBI also tied seven other players for the second most in a single game, trailing only Otto Velez, who had eight RBI in a game on May 17, 1973 against Rochester.


He was the second out in a triple play in 1978 (courtesy of an article called "TRIPLE PLAY DESCRIPTIONS" by Chuck Rosciam and Frank Hamilton [a PDF file]):

4/11/1978 San Diego Padres @ Atlanta Braves - Bottom of the 2nd - Score 0-0 (3 men on: Pat Rockett 1B, Rod Gilbreath 2B, Dale
Murphy 3B)
Phil Niekro (ATL) is the batter with a ?-? count. He hits a ground fielded by the 3B (Bill Almon) who steps on the bag to force the runner from
second, Rod Gilbreath (OUT 1)
3B throws to the 2B (Derrell Thomas) who touches second to retire the runner from first, Pat Rockett (OUT 2)
2B throws to the 1B (Gene Richards) who putsout the batter, Phil Niekro (OUT 3)

He had a game-ending RBI in the 10th inning against Skip Lockwood on 08/27/1977, which was his career year.

According to this article in the Dallas Morning News, Rockett was a wide receiver in high school, catching passes from one Tommy Kramer. An excerpt:

Thompson, too, was progressive. As a young assistant coach at San Antonio Jefferson in 1971, he closely followed the exploits of John Ferrara-coached Robert E. Lee, which won the state title that season behind the passing of Tommy Kramer to receivers Richard Osborne and Pat Rockett.

Pat Rockett. Wonder what he is doing today....?