Max effort

Long before Philadelphia's Phanatic and San Diego's Chicken – the prototypes for today's furball mascots – there is Max Patkin.

Tall man, few teeth, all fun.

Patkin is baseball’s Clown Prince for nearly 50 years.

His start comes on Harrisburg’s City Island, where 78 years ago today the Cleveland Indians hire Patkin as comic relief for their 1946 exhibition game against the Class B, minor league Harrisburg Senators.

Max Patkin with Kerry Baker in 1987

Patkin’s first crowd in Harrisburg is 3,333.

Over the next 47 years, Patkin travels 7 million miles and works more than 4,500 straight games, including this one in 1987 where he finds his way home past Harrisburg catcher Kerry Baker.

The end of the show for Patkin, though, comes in 1993, when a badly sprained ankle forces him to retire at the age of 73.

Patkin’s life and career are brilliantly captured in music by the incomparable Chuck Brodsky.

“I work under a great handicap,” Patkin once says, “I have no talent.”