Ron Washington rode the top step, ran his ball club and stood before us an apparently simple man.
There are winners and losers, that’s just a fact. And sometimes it seemed just that simple for Ron Washington, when all the gray was wiped away with the last pitch, the last game, every fall.
He was raised poor in New Orleans, but not wanting. He found the game, and it mostly loved him back. He bided his time, became a leader in his mid 50s, and twice nearly won that last game.
Washington seemed OK with that, with those rules and those outcomes, because there was always another day. There was always another season, win or lose.
But not anymore. The Texas Rangers lost again Thursday night. Washington resigned Friday.
He was manager of the Rangers for a few weeks shy of eight seasons, won more than he lost, won more than any Rangers manager ever had, and on Friday afternoon he walked away, out ahead of whatever might be chasing him.
He said he did not quit because the team was terrible. The team said he was not forced out. Neither was he persuaded to stay, however, and Washington packed up amidst questions about what would cause a man, at 62 years old, to quit a job he adored.
So, you’re left only to root for what seems a decent man, what is for certain a dedicated man and, yes, an occasionally flawed field manager, for whatever comes next.
“I deeply regret that I’ve let down the Rangers organization and our great fans,” Washington said in a statement.
He said he’d require time “to devote my full attention to addressing an off-the-field personal matter.” He called the decision “painful.” He concluded, “Thank you for respecting my privacy.”
The club said Washington’s resignation was not drug related. (He’d tested positive in 2009 for cocaine. Washington apologized the following spring, when the story emerged, and the front office stood behind him.) Beyond that, Rangers general manager Jon Daniels said, the reasons for Washington’s departure would leave with Washington.
Bench coach Tim Bogar will manage the Rangers’ final 22 games.
The team’s next manager will have the benefit of a great deal of talent and, presumably, far fewer injuries. The next team, the one that plays itself away from 2014, should have been Washington’s team, fair being fair. The Rangers won 91 games in 2013, then filled their trainer’s room in 2014, and will be lucky not to lose 100. Washington hated the losses, of course, but the season required playing – “That’s the way baseball go,” as he once said – so he’d shrug and set out to teach the young and overmatched Rangers a little more of the game. He’d lug his old fungo bat to the field, and he’d wear another layer of finish off it, and he’d have as good a time as he possibly could. He didn’t stop trying, he didn’t stop laughing, and he didn’t stop caring.
This has to stink, a reporter observed to Washington back in July. Washington granted that, but added: “I’m not miserable. Been here before, bein’ a baseball guy. My team needs to be taught how to play, so that’s where we are. We all wish we was handed gifts. Sometimes you gotta take what we get.”
He nodded. He was taking what he got.
“That’s where I’m at,” he said.
Maybe that’s just the job. It’s not like he had a choice. But he wouldn’t walk away for nothing. He wouldn’t surrender like this, unless there was something big out there and the choice was not his at all.
As third baseman Adrian Beltre told reporters in Texas, “We don’t know the details of the reason. If he decided it was time to go home, it was time to go home.”
Yes, Ron Washington went home. You hope he’s healthy. You hope he can be happy, at least as happy as he was on the top step, running his ball club, even a terrible one. You hope there’s more for him, at 62.
You hope it’s still simple for him.
