Sunday, August 30, 2009

1981 Topps, John Wathan



#157 John Wathan

Here is the second card of John Wathan that I got signed prior to the Willie Wilson classic last month.

For those of you that do not know, John set the catchers stolen base mark in 1982 when he swiped 31 bases. I have no idea if that is still a record or not. But, according to Ryan Lefebvre and Frank White, the Royals TV announcers, John Wathan hates the phrase "fast for a catcher". According to those two, John thinks that if you are fast, you are fast regardless of what position you play. Whenever they bring it up on a broadcast, it usually goes something like this- "Don't tell John Wathan this, but that guy is fast for a catcher".

2 comments:

night owl said...

I think this is a common pet peeve with catchers. Former catchers-turned-broadcasters Joe Garagiola and Tim McCarver both would complain about this phrase constantly on TV broadcasts.

zman40 said...

It's good to see that Joe is on-board with the effort. I was beginning to think that it was a fleet-footed catcher thing.