Toby Cook grew up in a small Kansas town and listened to his favorite baseball team on the radio every night. When his dad took him to his first Kansas City Royals game at age 8, he decided then and there he wanted to be a Major League Baseball play-by-play announcer. Thirty years later, his dream came true to work for the Royals after a successful run as a television news anchor and reporter. What he didn’t know those many years ago was that God would pave the way to the Royals… so that he could become Catholic!
Toby is the former Vice President of Publicity for the Royals and served as a team spokesperson to local, regional and national media. He’s an in-demand speaker around Kansas City on baseball, faith, family and community. Toby started in radio at the age of 16 and went on to host top-rated morning shows at TV stations in Kansas, Virginia and Missouri. He studied communications and was later named an Outstanding Alumnus at Pittsburg (Kan.) State University. Toby grew up in a loving home and, as an adult, was certified a deacon in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Through his studies to the diaconate, he started to discover more fully the Church Fathers and church history. After joining the Royals front office after a 25-year broadcast career, he met Royals Hall of Famer Mike Sweeney, who helped facilitate a Mass at the stadium for players and staff. Through the Mass and reading Catholic conversion stories, he and his wife, Barbara, quietly started taking RCIA classes. On Easter Vigil 2008, their entire family came home to Holy Mother Church. All because a lifelong dream of working for the Royals brought them “safe at home.”
