Hi Chris,
I generally used SAP Functions as a data source to my all crystal Reports and dashboards.
In that sense, I would say, you can ask the SAP ABAP developer to provide you a RFC ( Remote Function Call ) that will give you the data. Inside that RFC he can call the READ_TEXT and provide you the output.
Please let me know If i am missing something or not understood your requirement.
Regards,
Venkat