Justin Cowan is visiting his folks in Colorado and, at the moment, feeling like an overworked errand boy for his mother. "She's driving me crazy," the 27-year-old former University of Nebraska baseball star and recent graduate says after being instructed to move his car out of a clogged driveway.

About now, the 110-degree heat of Las Vegas, where Cowan is soon headed for what he hopes will be the beginning of a jackpot career in real estate, sounds like an oasis.

But it's still not quite the haven of his dreams, the one former Husker teammate Dan Johnson now lives in.

Six summers ago, Cowan embarked on his professional baseball career in the Kansas City Royals' organization. Cowan had just finished off a spectacular senior season in which he was Nebraska's top hitter and run producer while leading the Huskers to their first NCAA Super Regional, and the Royals scooped him up in the 10th round of the Major League Draft.

He had a good campaign with their Class A short-season affiliate in Spokane, Wash., too, leaving him more convinced he was off and running on a successful journey to the big leagues.

The same summer, Johnson, a hulking, free-swinging left-hander from Coon Rapids, Minn., who'd just hit 21 homers in his first season at NU, took a much different path while gearing up for his senior year. He played slow-pitch softball.

Guess who's now spraying balls around major-league parks?

"Dan's kind of one of those guys, he can roll out of bed and hit. I was one of those guys if my swing didn't feel good, I wasn't going to," said Cowan, who hung up his cleats in 2003, following yet another season in Class A.

Since being taken by Oakland in the seventh round of the 2001 draft — after he'd earned first-team All-America honors and been named a Howser Award finalist (college baseball's equivalent of the Heisman Trophy) by hitting .361 and leading the Big 12 Conference in home runs, RBIs, runs, walks, on-base and slugging percentage — Johnson has been on the fast track to the majors.

He produced big at both Class A short-season Vancouver, Canada, in 2001 and full-season Modesto, Calif., in '02, then was promoted to Double-A Midland, Texas, the next year and led the Texas League in homers and RBIs.

With that came another promotion, to Triple-A Sacramento, Calif., and Johnson responded by hitting 29 homers and driving in 111 runs, tops among players in the Athletics' minor-league system. Oakland then rewarded the Pacific Coast League's regular- and postseason MVP by bringing him up to the big  club in September.

A case of vertigo kept Johnson on the bench, but it became clear to officials in the organization that it was only a matter of time before he'd make his debut.

Sure enough, after he'd gotten off to another torrid start in Sacramento this season (.324, eight  homers), Johnson was called up following an injury to designated hitter Erubiel Durazo and was in the lineup on May 27. Since then, he has made it hard for the A's to take him out.

Johnson was the second of four players from the Huskers' 2000 team to make the majors.

Outfielder Jamal Strong — a sixth-round pick of Seattle in 2000 who holds one of the team's 40-man major-league roster spots but is playing in Triple-A Tacoma, Wash. — saw action in 12 games with the Mariners in 2003.

Last month, outfielder Adam Shabala — a 10th-round pick of San Francisco in 2000 who also had been deemed valuable enough to protect on the 40-man big-league roster — was called up to the Giants from Triple-A Fresno, Calif., and played in three games before being optioned back to Fresno.

And on Thursday, outfielder Adam Stern — a third-round pick of Atlanta in 2001 who was picked up by Boston in last December's Rule 5 Draft for eligible minor-leaguers — got called up from Triple-A Pawtucket, R.I. Stern, who needed to be placed on the Red Sox active 25-player roster by Tuesday if the club wanted to avoid having to offer him back to Atlanta, made his debut in Baltimore's Camden Yards and started in place of All-Star Johnny Damon.

Of course, for every Adam Stern and Dan Johnson, and their seemingly silky-smooth rise to the top, there are countless more examples like Cowan.

Or former NU pitcher R.D. Spiehs, a 33rd-round pick of San Francisco in 2001 who decided to bypass his senior season at NU.

Spiehs, who initially was offered a $2,500 signing bonus that climbed past $30,000 before he came to terms, started his pro career in 2002 with the Giants' Class-A affiliate in San Jose, Calif.

The next year, the burly right-handed reliever from Grand Island was dealt to San Diego as part of a trade that sent big-league pitcher Matt Herges to the Giants. Spiehs wound up at Double-A Mobile, Ala., where he stayed until being elevated to Triple-A Portland, Ore., a month into this season.

A month later, after 12 appearances there, he was traded to Seattle as part of a deal that involved Wilson Valdez, the Mariner's opening-day starting shortstop.

Now, the 25-year-old Spiehs is back in Double-A, in San Antonio. And while he's thriving with a 1-0 record and 1.35 ERA in nine games, he's much wiser to the ways of his world.

"It's been a roller coaster," Spiehs said. "You've got to grind it out, stay healthy, perform day in and day out and let the chips fall where they may.

"When I was traded from the Giants, there was hugs and congratulations. People were telling me ‘The Giants are a veteran team, they're in first every year and you'll have so many more opportunities with the Padres.' Now, it's ‘Look at the Padres' bullpen, they're in first place. No one is going to break those four right-handers, so this is a better fit even if you have to go back to Double-A.' We'll see."

Indeed.

Since 1998, the year Dave Van Horn came to Nebraska and began building the program into a national power, 28 Huskers have been drafted and signed. Of those, only 15 are still active in the MLB system. And just a third of that group have made it to the majors (besides Strong, Johnson, Shabala and Stern, Ken Harvey, an All-America first baseman at NU and fifth-round pick of Kansas City in 1999, got called up to the Royals in 2003. He was named to the 2004 American League All-Star team, but for all that glamour, he still began this season at Triple-A Omaha before being called back up.).

Spiehs decided to turned pro after his junior year at Nebraska, mainly because he was ready to make baseball his livelihood. He came to that conclusion even though he knew his signing bonus wouldn't go far, and that he'd struggle to cover his expenses on a minor-leaguer's starting monthly salary that barely reached four digits.

"It's tight living," Spiehs offers. "There wasn't one person whose paycheck would let them afford an apartment, so we all had host families — and that really helped. But then you've got clubhouse dues, and other things. (The money) goes away pretty quick."

For many players, the financial stress is nothing compared to the harsher reality of adapting to different cultures, trying to stand out among the dog-eat-dog masses of prospects, transitioning to a wooden-bat game and playing schedules that regularly consist of 29 or 30 games a month, with some god-awful bus trips to boot.

"It was kind of a wake-up call," Cowan said. "My first spring training was, ‘Man, there's a lot of kids here.'

"I remember showing up and hearing managers say, usually, two or three guys off every minor-league team you play for will make it (to the top level). And still, that doesn't dawn on you. You're coming from a major college and you think, ‘Well, I'll be one of the three.'"

Joe Simokaitis is going through the same process right now. The Huskers' starting shortstop the past four seasons is 11 games into his professional career playing for the Chicago Cubs' Class-A club in Peoria, Ill.

A 10th-round pick, Simokaitis intends only on having a two-month stay there before advancing to high-A ball next season.

"They have money invested in guys (that) they're going to give a little more of a shot, but I've still got to go out and produce," Simokaitis said. "For the most part, I think everybody realizes that.

"The first night I was here, a second-rounder who's been in the organization four or five years and was here rehabbing hit probably the farthest home run I've ever seen. After the game, he got released."

Those kind of tales are the ones that might sway Nebraska pitcher Brett Jensen into thinking he'd be better off returning for his senior season rather than accepting an offer from Washington, which selected him in the 23rd round of last month's draft. Jensen is planning on returning to NU.

But for someone like Jason Burch, a strapping right-handed pitcher from Papillion-La Vista who was a 21st-round pick of St. Louis in 2003, no horror story could have kept him from moving on after his junior year.

"It wasn't the money. I thought I had a chance to be pretty special," said Burch, who, a year after being involved in a deal that sent Colorado All-Star Larry Walker to the Cardinals, is now dominating for the Rockies' Class-A team in Modesto, Calif. "As a person, I was ready to move on and take the reins of my own life."

So was Cowan. But four years into his journey, he was still stuck in Class A playing with a bad hand — and ready to try a new one.

"I went into it wanting to move up every year. I didn't want to repeat a level unless it was Double-A or Triple-A," Cowan said. "We ended the (2003) season in September and I think I called the Royals' front office in October and said that was it. I was a year and half away from getting my degree, and I was 25 years old.

"If I would've had money in the bank, then I would've kept playing. … What it really comes down to is making the sacrifice. It's difficult. You're gone six months out of the year, and you really have to play well."

Cowan has no sour grapes about his experience, realizing how lucky he was to have the opportunity.

The same is likely to hold true for Spiehs — whether or not he makes it to the top rung of the ladder.

"After my second year, people are ‘How long are you going to battle this out for? When are you going to hang 'em up?' I was like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa! I think I've got a good grasp of the game — I'm confident in my abilities.'

"They'll probably have to tell me to shut it down. I don't think I'll ever do it on my own."

Reach Curt McKeever at 473-7441 or cmckeever@journalstar.com.