Nationals coach Randy Knorr teamed with Pat Mahomes in final season

Tracking down a connection between Patrick Mahomes and the Nationals wasn’t hard. Pat Mahomes and Randy Knorr were teammates in 2004.

Super Bowl Sunday, the day all eyes are squarely focused on football’s top game. There have been storylines aplenty about the two quarterbacks, Tom Brady and Patrick Mahomes. From the discussion of the GOAT giving way to the future heir of that title, to the debate of who will have the better career. There is even a baseball connection, with Brady having been selected in the 18th round of the 1995 MLB draft as a high school catcher, and Mahomes being the son of former major league pitcher, Pat Mahomes.

Knowing the elder Mahomes spent time in the Montreal Expos organization, I wanted to do a Kevin Baconesque six degrees of separation between Pat and the Washington Nationals organization.

Mahomes pitched for the Edmonton Trappers; the Expos Triple-A affiliate, for part of the season in 2004, throwing 24 innings in relief and finishing with a 4.88 ERA. Since this was the last season the Expos were in existence, before the franchise was moved to Washington, finding overlapping players was not difficult. Just had to narrow the path from Mahomes to someone on the 2021 Nationals team in as few people as possible.

Seeing some of those names on the Trappers roster, brought back a flood of memories from the first Nationals teams. The inaugural team, which exceeded expectations by winning 81 games, even though they finished last in the division and the 100 loss teams of both ’08 and ’09. The current team has come a long way since then.

As I sifted through the names I was prepared to begin my link with Ryan Church, an outfielder who hit .343 for the Trappers in ’04 and played three seasons in Washington before being traded to the New York Mets.

Wait, Nick Johnson made a rehab appearance in Edmonton in late May, and Mahomes wasn’t released from the team until early June. This link would get me a little further than Church as Johnson was a member of the Nationals until 2009 when he was traded to the Florida Marlins.

Then I stumbled upon one, Randy Knorr, and the research was over. Knorr, the current first base coach of the Nationals, was a catcher on the 2004 Trappers team. In what would be his last season as a player, the 35 year-old Knorr, hit .269 in 83 games. Not only were Knoor and Mahomes teammates, they were battery mates as well.

We can reach from relief pitcher Pat Mahomes to the current Washington Nationals in one person. Nothing wrong with infusing a little baseball into a day meant for football, right?