{"id":7058,"date":"2010-03-21T09:28:16","date_gmt":"2010-03-21T09:28:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=7058"},"modified":"2010-04-02T15:32:16","modified_gmt":"2010-04-02T14:32:16","slug":"rounding-the-bases-ron-washingtons-reputation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=7058","title":{"rendered":"Rounding the Bases: Ron Washington’s Reputation"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"MlbHlSq\"There are a lot of things you can take from reading Michael Lewis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 ‘Moneyball’<\/a>. One of them is an admiration and liking for Ron Washington.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

In common with most A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fans, I was extremely disappointed when he didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t succeed Ken Macha as the Oakland A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s manager after the 2006 season and, while sad to see him go, was glad when the Texas Rangers gave him a chance to be a Major League manager that offseason.\u00c2\u00a0 Wash was well-liked by all and had an excellent reputation within the game.\u00c2\u00a0 As a result, the news<\/a> this week that he had failed a drug test last year due to cocaine use was all the more shocking.<\/p>\n

For a start, few realised that managers were subject to drug testing; apparently all clubhouse personnel are now\u00c2\u00a0covered by MLB\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s programme.\u00c2\u00a0 Washington\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s positive test was kept secret at the time. Such confidentiality would be standard procedure for an employee not specifically covered by a public \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcouting\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 process, but the private nature of the offence was instantly in jeopardy once reporters started hearing rumours of the story.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0It was only a matter of time before the Rangers had to address it; however the claim that a former employee was using it to blackmail them makes the saga all the more depressing.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/p>\n

It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s been a major talking point this week and understandably so: if the manager of Tom Hicks\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 other sports team was involved in a similar story, the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcRafa Benitez\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bong bombshell\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 headlines would send the 24-hour news channels and radio phone-ins into overdrive.\u00c2\u00a0 The unfortunate consequence is that it leads to a lot of misinformed, hypocritical, moralising rubbish being spouted by people who just want to stick the boot in with undignified glee, rather than having any reasoned and intelligent comments to add to the discussion.<\/p>\n

Let\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s turn back to Washington\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s depiction in Moneyball. He was the A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s third base coach at the time and was charged with turning Billy Beane\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s experiments into players who could pass for fielders.\u00c2\u00a0 As the author Michael Lewis puts it at one point: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153When you asked Wash what it was like to be the infield coach for a team that would have started a blind man if he had a talent for getting on base, he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d grimace and say, \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcI seen some shit. I can tell you that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.<\/p>\n

Thankfully for the A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s, Washington was brilliant at his job.\u00c2\u00a0 This is shown most vividly by the section about Scott Hatteberg, a lifelong catcher who Wash had to turn into a first baseman.\u00c2\u00a0 He did this through spending countless hours working on Hatteberg\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s technique and also by working on his confidence.<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u0153\u00e2\u20ac\u2122He knew that what looked like a routine play wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t a routine play for me\u00e2\u20ac\u2122, said Hatty. Wash was helping him to fool himself, to make him feel better than he was, until he actually became better than he was.\u00c2\u00a0 At the Coliseum it was a long way from the A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s dugout to first base, but every time Hatty picked a throw out of the dirt \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a play most first basemen made with their eyes closed \u00e2\u20ac\u201c he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d hear Wash shout from the dugout:<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u02dcPickin\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Machine!\u00e2\u20ac\u2122<\/p>\n

He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d look over and see Wash with his fighting face on:<\/p>\n

\u00e2\u20ac\u02dcPickin\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Machine!\u00e2\u20ac\u2122<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Professional sports clubhouses (dressing rooms etc) are an unforgiving territory.\u00c2\u00a0 Players will size up a new coach or manager very quickly and anyone not up to the job struggles to survive long.\u00c2\u00a0 From the passages in Moneyball (\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Wash got inside your head because \u00e2\u20ac\u201c well, because you wanted Wash inside your head\u00e2\u20ac\u009d), to the many quotes elsewhere from A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s players of that era and the comments coming out the Rangers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 clubhouse this week, it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s undoubted that Washington has earned the respect of those he has worked with.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Such respect is not erased on the back of one, admittedly big, mistake.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

The fact that he has built up so much goodwill is a genuine reason for him to be treated sympathetically, although clearly that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not to excuse what he did.\u00c2\u00a0 Players generally can get away with irresponsible acts; however a manager should be older and wiser and they are employed to make judgements and decisions under great pressure.\u00c2\u00a0 Whether you can make a direct link between his decision-making process in these two very different situations is something only a person familiar with such matters can answer with any authority.\u00c2\u00a0 Still, the Rangers were right to carefully consider this before making their decision to retain him as their manager.<\/p>\n

We all know how it works: the Rangers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 performances on the field will determine whether Washington\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s drug use will lead to his sacking any time soon.\u00c2\u00a0 If the team is winning then everything will be fine; if they get off to a bad start to the season then the hacks will pick holes in every decision he makes, blame the team\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s failings on the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcdistraction\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 he has caused and he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll be sacked.\u00c2\u00a0 It might not be fair, but that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s how it is.<\/p>\n

That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s why, even as an A\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fan, I’m now\u00c2\u00a0hoping the Rangers have a good season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington has been the centre of attention this week following the news that he took cocaine<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[553,183,126],"class_list":["post-7058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mlb-2","tag-mlb-2","tag-ron-washington","tag-texas-rangers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7058","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7058"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7058\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7209,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7058\/revisions\/7209"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7058"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7058"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7058"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}