“To be successful in life you have to give up something” — Billy Hatcher

This featured appeared in the Arizona Daily Sun (June 19, 2004).

2015 update: Billy Hatcher is in his 10th season as a coach for the Cincinnati Reds.

LIVING A DREAM

By Ed Odeven
PHOENIX — He had seven consecutive hits in the 1990 World Series, helping the Cincinnati Reds sweep the heavily favored Oakland A’s. He hit a game-tying 14th-inning home run in the action-packed Game 6 of the 1986 National League Championship Series.

Those were, of course, memorable moments. But Billy Hatcher’s point of view is this: His biggest thrill as a big league ballplayer occurred the first moment he donned a Chicago Cubs uniform in 1984, his first day in the majors.

“My first time getting called up to the big leagues was just amazing,” said Hatcher, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays’ first base coach, before Friday’s game against the Arizona Diamondbacks at Bank One Ballpark. “It was…