Aiding Baseball Dreams, but Knowing the Reality The FirstEnergy Stadium, home of the Fightin Phils. READING, Pa. - The buzz surrounding Alex Rodriguez's cameo this week with the Trenton Thunder has had little effect on Dusty Wathan, the manager of the Reading Fightin Phils. Amid all the hoopla, Wathan has stuck to routine: coaching, teaching, counseling. "We come out and do our thing every day," Wathan said before Tuesday night's game at FirstEnergy Stadium, where Rodriguez continued his rehabilitation assignment from off-season hip surgery. I do think A-Rod being here is good for the players, especially the younger guys who might not ever make it to the big leagues. Maybe one day they'll get to tell their kids, "Hey, I faced A-Rod." Hopefully, all these kids make it to the big leagues. But let's be honest: probably not many of them will. Wathan, 39, understands the hard lessons of baseball better than most. He knows that Rodriguez, armed with a 10-year contract worth $275 million, is the exception. Most professional players spend their careers plugging away in outposts like Reading, the Philadelphia Phillies" Class AA affiliate, striving for something just beyond their reach. Wathan, for example, had a 14-year career as a minor league catcher. He endured more 10-hour bus rides than he cares to remember. He played for everyone from the Everett AquaSox to the Lancaster JetHawks. He produced a .273 batting average in 1,019 games. He was best known for being hit by pitches 151 times. But for one week, at least, Wathan had a taste - a week when he and Rodriguez were actually peers. Wathan appeared in three games with the Kansas City Royals over six days near the end of the 2002 season, and it was the stuff of magic. Wathan had three hits in five at-bats, and then it was over. He was back in the minors the next season, and he remained there until his playing days came to an unceremonious end in 2007. He has never felt sorry for himself, he said, and he has never questioned whether he was given a fair shake. As the son of a coach - his father, John, managed the Royals and the California Angels in the late 1980s and early 1990s - Dusty Wathan tackled baseball from the start with the full knowledge that the game could be political: hot-shot prospects usually move up the ladder with greater ease than undrafted catchers. He also was aware of his limitations. "I was always good for where I was playing, but I was never great," Wathan said. I was never offered a big-time college scholarship or anything like that. I guess you could say I was serviceable on most levels. The whole goal when I signed was to play long enough to maybe get a coaching job. Jim Murphy, a first baseman for Reading, described Wathan as a "players coach," and that seemed fairly self-explanatory. After signing with the Seattle Mariners" organization for $1,000 in 1994, Wathan played for 17 clubs at every conceivable level, from Class A to the big leagues. He can recite his stops in chronological order. He spent a winter in Venezuela. He was promoted, traded and released several times over. Wathan said he often supplemented his salary during the off-season by working at Costco or by driving a package delivery truck. When he decided to make the transition to coaching seven years ago, he was earning the most he ever had in baseball: $13,000 a month. "He's done everything we've done," said Murphy, who recalled that Wathan was one of the first people who reached out to him two years ago when he was demoted to low-level Class A. "Anytime you go through a tough situation in life, you want to have people you can trust and look up to." Before the start of the 2002 season, Wathan was a free agent and sought employment by calling minor league directors. After earning an invitation to spring training with the San Diego Padres, he was sent to the Huntsville Stars, the Class AA affiliate of the Milwaukee Brewers, before landing with the Omaha Royals of the Class AAA Pacific Coast League. Wathan was hitting .288 with Omaha when he got The Call in September: his presence was requested in Kansas City. The promotion was more about circumstance than merit. Wathan said the Royals had two catchers whose wives were expecting. They needed someone in case of an emergency. Wathan was finally summoned to pinch-hit against the Detroit Tigers on Sept. Facing Jeff Farnsworth, a former minor league teammate (then again, who wasn't?), Wathan roped an outside fastball into right field for a run-scoring double. "At that point, it's kind of surreal," Wathan said. I'll tell you the biggest concern I had was when I went out to catch: not wanting to throw the ball into center field. You've thrown the ball to second base how many millions of times? And you're like, well, don't throw the ball into center field in front of all these people. Wathan seldom talks about his playing career. There was the game in 2005 when he crushed three home runs - a two-run shot, a three-run shot and a grand slam - for the Buffalo Bisons, then the Class AAA affiliate of the Cleveland Indians. Yet Murphy, the first baseman, said he had never heard Wathan mention it. "He's here for us now," Murphy said. He's not out here trying to prove his self-worth. He's already done that. These days, Wathan says he enjoys few things more than the chance to tell a player that he is being promoted to the major leagues. He had two such conversations last season. "Telling a kid that his dream is about to come true?" he said. It's one of the most fulfilling things you can do in the business.