SPORTS

Brian Drahman: Great Falls' summer son

Mark D. Robertson

When Brian Drahman was sent to the Pioneer League as a player in 1986, somebody had to point out Montana on a map.

The Florida native was a second-round draft pick of the Milwaukee Brewers, and he was headed to Helena to play for the team then known as the Gold Sox.

"14 hours later on a plane, I was here," Drahman said.

Just 19-years-old, Drahman pitched in 18 games that season for a team that featured future Major League stars Gary Sheffield and Greg Vaughn.

Drahman went on to pitch in The Show in parts of four seasons himself, but since he threw his last professional pitch in 2001, the Great Falls Voyagers pitching coach has found a summer home in the Electric City despite the distance between Montana and his native Florida, where Drahman spends the offseason.

Part of that is the people in Great Falls, Montana.

"They're all nice people, so it's a great place," Drahman said. "People want to help people. You don't see that much anymore in the world."

And then, as Montana imports are apt to say, there is the scenery.

"It's beautiful country," he added. "I don't fish; I don't hunt. But if I did, it would be a paradise. … But I just like looking at it."

Now in his seventh season, Drahman has made some lasting connections in town.

"It's kind of like his second home, Great Falls," said Jim Keough, who was the Voyagers' general manager when Drahman was first hired as pitching coach. "It's just the people."

Keough and Drahman have remained friends over the years, both said, and there's a mutual respect.

"He feels comfortable in this position," Keough observed. "…In his heart, he really believes in developing pitchers."

It just so happens that Drahman, 48, is pretty good at coaching in Rookie ball, too. Great Falls has made the Pioneer League playoffs all six seasons the former big-leaguer has been in the dugout.

"Real quickly I think the players understand that he cares that they get better, and I think that's half the battle," said Curt Hasler, the Minor League pitching coordinator for the Chicago White Sox organization, with which the Voyagers have been affiliated since 2003.

"The other half," Hasler continued, "is to see the things that it takes for the players to get better, and Drah sees those things."

Hasler said the Sox rely on Drahman for a lot more than coaching young hurlers in Great Falls, too. The former big-leaguer handles many of the coaching duties in extended spring training, including overseeing Major League rehabilitation outings for pitchers.

So, the lay person may ask, if he's such a great coach, why does Drahman remain in the lower levels of Minor League ball each summer?

That, Hasler said, is because he's simply good with young pitchers: he coaches the way the White Sox want them coached, and he takes it seriously.

"He gets what we're talking about as an organization, and he truly cares," Hasler reiterated. "Sometimes those guys need someone to get on them, and sometimes they need a pat on the back. He knows how and when to do both those things."

Drahman said it's not all no-nonsense in the clubhouse, though.

"I'm not the dictator down there," he said. "This is fun for me too. I want guys to be involved. I want questions."

And though Drahman is in his seventh season in Great Falls, location may be the only stability in that post. Players come and go, as the Minor League system is designed to have them do. He's also on his sixth manager this year, with first-year skipper Cole Armstrong taking the reins with the Voyagers.

Armstrong is in his first managing role, and hitting coach Justin Jirschele quit his playing career this spring to assume that post.

"It's been a big help for myself and Jirsch as young coaches, having him there to kind of guide us along," Armstrong said. "Whether it be the travel schedule or, you know, setting up a bullpen, he's been a tremendous help to the both of us."

So why no move up the ladder, so to speak?

"If they want to move me up, they could move me up," Drahman said.

But he's enjoyed success in the Pioneer, and the White Sox seem to like the way he works with younger pitchers.

"I don't want to sit there and say I do this or that better than anybody else, but I think I have a rapport with the guys that I work with here," Drahman said.

Hasler agreed.

"There might come a time where we have to send him to A or AA — and he can do that — but he's doing a hell of a job here, as witnessed by a lot of the guys who move up and continue to have success," the pitching coordinator said.

And that is all Drahman could ask for.

"I'm fine with where I'm at," he said. "I'm coaching baseball. It's a thing I love, no matter if it's the younger guys or the older guys."