Patterson made his Sheffield Shield debut for New South Wales against
Western Australia in November 2011. He made an immediate statement by scoring 157 in the first innings and remaining 6 not out in the second innings as New South Wales won the match by 6 wickets. This performance earned him the player of the match honours. His century in the first innings saw him become the youngest player to score a century in the Sheffield Shield. At the age of 18 years and 206 days he broke the record that was previously held by
Barry Shepherd, who scored a century aged 18 years and 241 days in 1955. Despite this initial success, he was not selected to play for New South Wales for the rest of the season. Patterson returned to the New South Wales side during the
2013/2014 season, playing 7 out of 11 games. Throughout the season he scored a total of 403 runs at an average of 31.00. He scored 4 half-centuries during the season, including 52 in the final against Western Australia, which was won by New South Wales. Patterson produced similar statistics during the
2014/2015 season, scoring 372 runs at an average of 28.61. Patterson's break out year came during the
2015/2016 season. Play all but one game, he scored a total of 737 runs at an average of 52.64, which included two centuries and four half-centuries. This made him the highest run-scorer for New South Wales that season and the 6th highest run-scorer in the whole competition. He was then selected for
Australia A to play in a 2016 winter series against South Africa A and India A. In two unofficial test matches against South Africa A, Patterson made scores of 74, 6, 92, and 50 not out. This made him the highest scorer in the series among both sides. During this offseason, he also played 6 one day matches for Australia A in a quadrangular series against India A, South Africa A, and Australia's National Performance Squad. His stand-out performance in the series was a score of 115 against India A in a match that Australia A won by 1 run. Still aged just 23 and with a first-class batting average of 42.91, Patterson was now in contention for national selection. Before the start of the 2016/2017 season, former New South Wales and Australian wicketkeeper
Brad Haddin said that Patterson could be in contention to play for Australia that summer. He furthered his case by scoring a century against
Queensland in the first round of the 2016/2017 Sheffield Shield season. After this innings, New South Wales coach
Trent Johnston said he believed Patterson was ready for test cricket and deserved a chance at international level. However, Patterson was not selected for Australia and played out the rest of the season in the Sheffield Shield. Although he did not score a century for the rest of the season, he still finished the season with 668 runs at an average of 44.53. This was followed by another strong domestic season in 2017/2018 where he scored 672 runs. This marked the second time in three years that Patterson was the highest run-scorer for New South Wales. Despite his consistent run scoring ability, questions began to be asked in the media about his ability to convert his half-centuries into bigger scores. However, in round 5 of the 2018/2019, he made a score of 107 not out against Western Australia, his first Sheffield Shield century since 2016. Between that time, he had scored a total of 14 half-centuries without scoring a century.
Domestic One-Day Career Since 2013, Patterson has played for New South Wales in Australia's
domestic one-day competition. In his first year playing in the competition, he played 7 out of 8 matches and made 152 runs at an average of 25.33 as New South Wales finished runners up in the competition. He following year he had a slightly improved season, scoring 230 runs at an average of 32.85. He had his most successful season in the
2016 competition when he averaged 49.40. In the final, Patterson scored 77 not out as New South Wales won the title. Just before the start of the 2018 competition, New South Wales captain
Peter Nevill broke his thumb, and Patterson was named as the new captain. He had a difficult start as captain as New South Wales lost the first 3 games of the season. He also struggled individually, averaging 23.80 for the season. After being in contention for a
Test call-up in the
2017–18 Ashes series, Patterson played every match for New South Wales in the
2017–18 JLT One-Day Cup, scoring two fifties and
averaging 41.33 runs per innings to be one of the team's top run-scorers for the tournament. During the
2019 season, Patterson was hampered by a quad injury, playing only two matches in the competition.
Big Bash career For the inaugural season of the Big Bash League, Australia's franchise Twenty20 competition, Patterson was offered a roster spot by the
Sydney Thunder. However, he turned it down to focus on making the New South Wales Sheffield Shield side. In the second season of the Big Bash, Patterson was signed by the
Sydney Sixers franchise for the 2012/2013 season. In his first season, he only played one game for the Sixers. The following season, he was signed by cross-town rivals the Sydney Thunder. Patterson was not regularly selected for the Thunder, playing only 9 games in each of the next three seasons. In later seasons of the Big Bash he began to play for games for the Thunder but failed to make a significant impact. In his time at the Thunder, he played a total of 25 matches in 8 seasons with a total of 438 runs and a high score of 48. Just before the start of the
2019/2020 Big Bash season, Patterson signed a 3-year deal with the Perth Scorchers. He missed the opening rounds of the season due to a hamstring injury. He finally made his debut for the Scorchers in January 2020, however, after scoring 38 runs in 3 matches, he was dropped for the remainder of the season due to lack of runs. ==International career==