Jack Perconte played seven years in the majors, including as a regular with the Seattle Mariners, stealing around 30 bases each year in the two years he was with them.

Perconte was drafted by the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1976, and after a successful minor league career, had a couple cups of coffee with them in 1980 and 1981. Los Angeles won the World Series in 1981, but Perconte did not appear in it. He spent most of 1981 with the Albuquerque Dukes, hitting .346.

Traded with Rick Sutcliffe to the Cleveland Indians, he appeared in 93 games with them in 1982, hitting .237. The following year he was up for only 14 games. After the 1983 season, he was traded with Gorman Thomas to Seattle for Tony Bernazard.

In 1984, he hit .294 and scored 93 runs, while in 1985, he hit .264 in 125 games. He had good range in the field. In a celebrated incident, he was sent to the minors in mid-season although playing quite well. He finished his career in 1986 playing 24 games for the Chicago White Sox.

Jack grew up in Joliet, Illinois and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree from Murray State University. His father is Frank Perconte who is famous for being a soldier of Easy Company, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division during the Second World War.

Upon retiring from professional baseball, Jack opened Jack Perconte’s Sports Academy in Naperville, IL, which he operated for 19 years. Jack taught baseball and softball to thousands of young baseball and softball players. Jack estimated he gave approximately 60,000 lessons and conducted hundreds of camps and clinics for players of all ages.

Jack recently sold his academy in order to write books and pursue other coaching opportunities. “The Making of a Hitter,” was published in January 2009 and is Jack’s first book and his second book “Raising an Athlete” came out in September 2009.

Jack believes the best way to help kids is through the education of coaches and parents of athletes, so ultimately the kids are the ones who benefit. His two books are distributed worldwide by IPG (Independent Publishers Group).