There’s a well-worn story of late Padres owner and McDonald’s founder Ray Kroc meeting Steve Garvey at his La Jolla home, where he jokingly told the All-Star he would pay him in Big Macs and those salty fries.

That might have been closer to reality than most thought.

Team president Ballard Smith said he had been told to slam the financial brakes by Kroc’s wife, Joan, as they began to build a winner.

“Joan said, ‘I’m tired of Ray putting money into the Padres,’” Smith recently recalled. “‘There’s no more money. You have to run it based on revenue.’ Ray, in a wheelchair at the time, was excited about Garvey, but Joan said, ‘Where are you going to get the money to sign him?’”

Forty years after the Padres put it all together on the way to the 1984 World Series, the price of history involved creativity as much as the incomparable bat of Tony Gwynn, base-swiping speed of Alan Wiggins and bankable mound presence of Eric Show.

There was a quiet capital call to land Garvey, fancy accounting to lure Goose Gossage and a tricky conversation to scoop up Graig Nettles. Toss in a candid moment with would-be manager Dick Williams and the title-chasing dominoes extended in a variety of directions.

Start with Garvey.

“I went to (CEO) Scott Jones of Ace Parking,” Smith said in a story confirmed by Jones. “I said, ‘Scott, we want to sign Garvey. We need to get a pile of money and your parking will go up.’ He gave us money without hesitation.

“Then I went to Paul Palmer, who was running KFMB at the time, and said the team will be more exciting and ad revenue will go up. He put in some money.”

Smith is the forgotten piece of the puzzle that reached a magical finish line four decades ago. He often yielded the stage to General Manager Jack McKeon and his role routinely was diluted in a public-perception sense because he married Joan’s daughter, Linda.

Silver spoons are tough spoons to shake.

“Was Ballard given enough credit? Probably not,” Garvey said. “He really started (the Padres’) history.”

Longtime Padres broadcaster Ted Leitner back-stopped the former first baseman.

“You’re not going to get the respect in that situation,” Leitner said. “It’s the ‘We all know how you got this job’ sort of thing. Never mind how he got the job. How’d he do? The answer is, very well.”

Smith said McKeon downplayed the prospects of Garvey.

“McKeon was telling everybody Garvey was over the hill and a waste of money,” Smith said. “Even though Jack talked about signing him, he had zero to do with it. We were starting to develop some young players, so we needed some veterans.

“Even though everyone there hated the Dodgers, we knew what a great player he was.”

Smith also navigated the bumpy hiring of Dick Williams, a prickly sort who was known for his baloney-free approach that had the potential to toughen the group.

Williams was known for ruffling feathers … and winning.

“Dick Williams had a reputation of being a (jerk) and a drinker,” Smith said. “He got fired from the Expos. I talked to (Expos owner) Charles Bronfman, who said, ‘Look, I don’t care how many World Series you win with him, someday you’ll regret it.’

“His personality, players hated him. But there probably was not a better in-game manager. We talked about the drinking and he said he had it under control.

“The results speak for themselves and he’s in the Hall of Fame. I don’t know if we win in 1984 without him.”

Smith also had to be open-minded as he guided key parts of the build involving the Padres.

The franchise hunted for veterans to balance out the clubhouse. They began to look at key pieces from the respected and storied Yankees.

When eyes drifted toward the steely closer Gossage entering 1984, financial challenges reared up again.

“We were told they’re done putting money in the team,” said Dick Freeman, the Padres’ chief financial officer at the time. “They said, ‘Either we are self-sustaining or we’ll sell the team.’”

Freeman cooked up the idea of a long-term annuity that would be paid to Gossage, easing the financial pressure in the moment. It was believed to be groundbreaking at the time.

The money juggling two-step made the deal happen.

“It was Dick’s idea and it was brilliant,” Smith said. “All I did was run with it.”

Another potential piece was waiting.

McKeon tire-checked the possibility of luring the third baseman Nettles, a San Diego-rooted star who played at San Diego High and San Diego State.

One large issue: fiery Yankees owner George Steinbrenner.

“Jack put together that trade, but Steinbrenner felt he should only talk to owners or people with ties to ownership,” Smith said. “George wasn’t going to talk to Jack, but I was the son-in-law (of the Krocs). That was kind of the final piece of the 1984 team.”

Nettles was asked what 1984 would have become without the fingerprints of Smith.

“What I remember most about Ballard, I was a player and I was older than him,” Nettles said from his residence in Knoxville, Tenn. “What would it have been without (all those pieces)? It would have been the Tony Gwynn show.”

Leitner, the legendary broadcaster, carried the point farther.

“We forget what Ballard Smith did for this franchise,” he said. “I’ve been waving this flag for years. Ballard was the forgotten guy.”

Forgotten, no more.