Pat Williams Transcript

November 25, 2007

Announcer: …Now, here’s your host, Dr. Kent.

Dr. Kent Gustavson: Welcome to Sound Authors Radio. Today is the day after Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is the day of feasting, praying, watching football, reestablishing old connections and making new ones. My guests on the show today are Pat Williams, the Senior Vice-President of the Orlando Magic, inspirational speaker; Lars Clausen, author, activist, and Guinness world record holder in the unicycle; D. Castle-Shepard, military chaplain and author of “Faith in the New Militia”, talking to us about the troops on Thanksgiving; and, Robbie Kumalo with her new children’s music CD “Music Makes Me Happy”, very thankful music.My first guest is Pat Williams, the Senior Vice-President of the Orlando Magic, motivational and inspirational speaker, former baseball player, 23 of his former teams have gone to the NBA playoffs and five have gone to the NBA finals. He’s the parent of 19 children, is that right?

Pat Williams: Kent, I’ve got 19 out of them, you’re right. Fourteen had been adopted lest you think I’m really weird. They are all grown and out of the house, the youngest is about to hit 22 now and the oldest is 35. So we’re now getting into the grandparenting world as well.

Kent: So what’s Thanksgiving like at your house?

Pat: Well, it’s big, it’s big. We’ve got a 16-foot long dining room table. And years ago, I figured out a way to bond in marriage a turkey and a centipede, in that way, every kid got a drumstick. So we have quite a Thanksgiving at our house. And if you want me to tell these jokes a little slower, I will.

Kent: No, I think I got it. So this year on Thanksgiving, where were you?

Pat: We’re always in our home in Winter Park, Florida. Yes, I try and make a vow, and I have to break it occasionally. We don’t go north of Orlando until May. So we try and spend as much time in the winter in Florida as we can.

Kent: Where did you grow up?

Pat: I grew up in Wilmington, Delaware, right near Philadelphia, and went to Wake Forest University to college then on to Indiana University to get my master’s many years ago. So I’m originally from that Delaware Valley Region.

Kent: Tell me a little bit about your experience in sports.

Pat: Well, I spent my entire adult life in sports. I signed the contract with the Phillies Organization right out of college. I was a minor league ball player, spent two years as a catcher in their farm system, and then got into the administrative end of baseball. I spent a total of seven years in the Phillies Organization as a player and a minor league executive, and 39 years ago this past summer, I left baseball to go into the National Basketball Association in the front office, and I have been there ever since. One year with the 76ers, four years with the Chicago Bulls, a year with the Atlanta Hawks, back to Philadelphia for 12 more years and then came to Orlando 21 years ago to help start the magic opposite an expansion team and got sand in my shoes and we’ve never left Florida.

Kent: What made you become an author out of all that sports experience?

Pat: Well, I would say by accident more than anything. The first book I wrote, I was a general manager of the Bulls in Chicago and a young man walked into my office one day to do an interview for a newspaper he was working for in the suburbs of Chicago. He came back later and asks if I would be interested in doing a book, and after I stopped laughing, I said, “Why not?” I never thought to think about. Then a whole year went by, and then the young man came back again and said, “I got a publisher.” So that led to the book I wrote in the fall of 1974 called the “The Gingerbread Man” which was the story of my life up to that point. By the way, that young author has done quite well, his name is Jerry Jenkins. He and Tim LaHaye have co-authored the “Left Behind” series which has sold about 60 million copies over the years. So young Jerry did well for himself.

Kent: They’ve done all right. Why did you choose to inspire other people? You could be completely successful on your life and be happy just doing that. Why do you choose to go out and try to inspire people?

Pat: Well, I think we live here on this earth to make a difference in people’s lives. I’ve always felt that sports was a door opener, with the great interest we have in sports in our country that it does give those of us in the profession a platform, a sphere of influence, so to speak. I think it’s important to use that sphere of influence in a positive way. So anything I can write or say in my speaking or in my books that give people hope or inspiration, give them a focus in life, and give them a nudge or an encouragement to live life at a higher level. I think that’s a high honor very frankly because in the business of sports, the games are soon forgotten, all the events. I can’t remember too much about any of the games that I’ve been involved in for the last 45 years, but the impact on lives I think lasts a lot longer.

Kent: Did you have some people that you looked up to at the very beginning that you wanted to be like?

Pat: I definitely had some role models; there are some important mentors in my life. Like the coaches through my youth and my high school and college. As I got out into the real world as a young executive, Bill Beck, the great baseball promoter took an interest in me and for 25 years, he was a friend and a mentor and an influence. The first owner of the teams I worked for in Spartanburg, South Carolina, Mr. R.E. Littlejohn became really a surrogate father to me. As the years went on, I didn’t do anything in my life without consulting with him and seeking his wisdom and his counsel. So I’ve been very fortunate to have some important people in my life particularly as a young man.

Kent: Let’s talk about your last couple of books. The “Ultimate Coaches Clinic: Career-Enhancing Insights from More Than 1, 000 of America’s Foremost Coaches and Leaders”, and there’s another book called “How to be Like Women Athletes of Influence”.

Kent: Let me just take one at a time. This book “How to be Like Women Athletes of Influence” is the eighth in a series that I’ve done with health communications, “The Chicken Soup for the Soul” publishers and this one features the 32 most impactful women athletes of history. We wrote a chapter on each one of them. I was able to interview 21 of the women, which was a real thrill for me. But in addition to telling their stories in these chapters, at the end of each chapter, we list the life’s lessons so that we can learn from all of these women. Be a Billy Jean King or Nancy Lopez or Mia Hamm. There are life’s lessons for those remarkable women, and we do that, we list them, so the people really can have that and take it away and apply to their lives. So, I think the book is more for, more than just for young women, or young women athletes, I think it touches male and female and it sure touched me in writing the book.The second one that you mentioned, the Ultimate Coaches’ Clinic. About three years ago, my son Bobby who was in baseball at the time, we got an offer to Washington Nationals, as a manager in their farm system. He was 27 years old and.Over the phone he said to me that day: “Dad, what do I do now?” His voice was up about three octaves. [laughs]And I’m sure that’s the question, Kent, that every young man or woman, either their first pastorate, or their high school principal job, or their first head coaching job or whatever the first leadership position is, I’m sure that they have all thought that.About a two and a half year period went by, and I kept asking coaches everywhere I went: tell me the four things you would tell my son. And when they told me I wrote it down and sent Bobby a copy, kept a copy myself, and I started counting and I had hundreds of these. And then I thought you know, that high school in Des Moines, or the girls’ basketball coach up in Hanover, New Hampshire, you know, she’s not going to get to these coaches. I thought I think we’ve got a treasure trove here.So we found a publisher on the West Coast who gears their work toward high school coaches, particularly in — we did the book — I ran the material as the coaches shared it with me. In other words, it’s the raw footage. I really feel it’s a pretty priceless collection. Numbers of these coaches have passed away since I spoke with them. I mined booked from the diseased coaches from Tom Landry to Newt Rockney and many others. I think it’s a real compilation that can be of value.But I’ll tell you this, Kent; it’s far beyond just for coaches because those principles that these guys and these women shared are leadership principles that apply to anybody in a position of leadership, regardless of the field.

Kent: Raising kids. Clearly you have a lot of experience in that as well. And every coach in some way raises children on the field also. I myself was an athlete and had many coaches that shaped my life. In what way can coaches do a better job of encouraging kids to be their best?

Pat: Well, I think, Kent, what I have learned through all this is that as parents or as grandparents, coaches, teachers, pastors, youth workers, if you will view those young people that are in your field of influence, if they are your responsibility as Coach Wooden [sp] would say, “under your supervision.”If you start viewing them as leaders and future leaders that you are investing in, I think it changes the way you coach, teach, parent and pastor. These are future leaders that you are investing in and you are in the leadership development business. I think you will do everything differently. As you view that you are getting these young men and women ready for a life of leadership and you are putting that leadership baton into their hands and you are training the next generation of young leaders.I think it will make a different coach out of you totally.

Kent: So here’s a question for you: I teach at a couple of universities out here in New York and I even in the classes I teach, I have graduate students and college students. There is a great different between all the generations now. There is the Y generation, there’s the younger generation, the YouTube generation. There are the Baby Boomers that are going into retirement. How do you see these generations interacting through sports?

Pat: I think sports frankly Kent, is the generational bonding piece. You know, we have all heard about Dad takes his son to the ballgame and then the son grows up and takes his son to the ballgame, and that whole generational pass down from sports.I now have grandchildren, we’ve already started to take them to their swimming lessons and gymnastics and I can’t wait for our first grandson to get big enough to start playing catch with. I’m eager to take him to ballgames, as my dad did with me. I think sports are the one bonding link, the one adhesive, perhaps, that cuts across all generational gaps and brings us all together as a society. I think that is one of the beauties of sports.

Kent: And it’s also not just for men, which is really shown well by your book. How to be like women athletes and influence.

Pat: Well, the women’s sports movement, Kent, is enormous. I can remember when I was in college in the late 50s; early 60s there was no such thing as intercollegiate sports for women. Back in my high school day they did have women’s/girls’ sports teams, although I’ll tell you this, the basketball team had a line across the middle of the floor. There were three offensive players and three defensive players, and offense and defense could not cross that mid court line. You had to pass it over to the other set of players on your team because if you ran too much as a girl, you might collapse.[laughs]

Pat: And the thought of a woman running marathons… are you kidding me? I ran the Chicago marathon back in early October. Kent, half the field of 35, 000 were women. So, I think that growth of women’s sports is phenomenal and hopefully, these 32 women in the book had to be like women athletes of influence will really reach out and inspire some young ladies who I could be writing about in the 20 or 30 years.

Kent: It’s been a real pleasure speaking with you. Could you tell me where we could find your books?

Pat: Kent, they’re in bookstores obviously. And I always encourage people to visit my website. That’sPatWilliamsMotivate.com, PatWilliamsMotivate.com, and I hope people check that out and I’m sure they will be quite intrigued in learning about these books and I’m so glad we could visit. Thanks so much for thinking of me.

Kent: One more question for you. Do you sit down and watch sports on television on Thanksgiving or do you get out and play them?

Pat: I’ll get out a good couple hour jog that day to work off the turkey and the sweet potatoes. We’ll watch a little football and, of course, the Orlando Magic are big down here in central Florida. We’re not playing that day but we have got home games the next Friday and Saturday right after Thanksgiving. The Magic is a big part of the sports fiber here in the greater Orlando area.