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MLB WORLD SERIES: RANGERS v GIANTSOctober 27, 2010Ron WashingtonSAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA: Game One Q. You guys have had a terrific enjoyment level going throughout the entire post-season. Under the intense pressure of the World Series I imagine that'll continue? RON WASHINGTON: Oh, without a doubt. You prepare for this moment, and now the moment is here. The one thing you've got to make sure you do is just understand that you have to stay in the moment and go out there and do what you've been doing all year, play baseball. You know, my guys are ready to do that. We're excited. The moment hasn't hit me yet, but I think once we get off the field after introductions and get back in the dugout, it'll be game on. Q. One of your players said that you fit right in in the clubhouse, that they think of you as a player as well as manager. How important is that to you? And also, do you participate in games in the clubhouse like dominos, and how good a player are you? RON WASHINGTON: Well, I consider myself a very good domino player, but we have some very good domino players in there, and they make you look like you're not so good. But you know, I just enjoy when good things happen on the baseball field and I wear my emotions on my sleeves. I'm not trying to be any different than anyone else. That's just a passion that I have for the game. I think when they see how much I love what they're doing, it helps. I've just always been -- before I became a manager, I was a teacher, so I spent a lot of time with a lot of players, having many conversations about many things. I just can't change who I am. I'm a working manager. I get out on the field. I continue to do things in my area of expertise, which is infield, and I continue to do that. I throw my BP, I hit my fungoes. I'm just a working guy. I think my players, they just buy into it. And they know I've got their backs. They know it doesn't matter how many mistakes they make, as long as they're aggressive mistakes, we can get past them. They play for me. And when I was a teacher, my kids learned from me. You're only as good as your pupils go out there and apply whatever you give them. We're applying the things that I actually wanted us to do as far as baseball goes, just respect the game, play the game, become fundamental, do the things the game asks you, and they've done that. Q. The style you embrace is almost like a traditional National League style. What's been your experience when you've managed under National League rules? Have you enjoyed the way the game is played in that situation? RON WASHINGTON: Well, I have, because everyone stays engaged. All the players have to stay engaged because they never know when they may find themselves in the ballgame. The one thing I love more than anything else is myself and my coaching staffs, we just huddle. We've all got input on what we need to do. We're always aware where the pitcher is in that lineup. It's just a lot of fun. And everybody has to stay focused, but you know, I come from a background of aggressiveness. I came up through the Kansas City Royals organization, I came up through the Dodgers organization, and then when I arrived in Minnesota, it was back to the fundamentals. I just try to play the game, once again, with a lot of respect, and I've always wanted my teams to be teams that can do whatever the game asks. I didn't want to be a one-dimensional team. I just didn't want to play the game one way. I have the talent that can play the game many ways, so when you have talent like that, you've got to use it. If you have talent that can only hit the ball out of the ballpark, then you have to wait for the three-run bomb. We don't have to do that. I enjoy baseball like that. People tell me it's National League, but I say it's baseball. Q. Can you talk about your decision to add Mark Lowe to the roster and what you saw from him that allowed you to do that at such a critical point. RON WASHINGTON: Well, we didn't need any length. We have length. This team is predominantly right-handed. We liked what we saw out of Mark. He uses the bottom half of the strike zone. He has a good sink, good slider, changeup. He'll be a good bridge guy for us. He'll be a guy that can come in if with he need two outs. He'll get us two outs to get to someone else. As far as the back end of the bullpen goes, we have guys to take care of that, but we needed his strength, and his strength is ground balls. Q. When you were over here in Oakland, your rapport with the players and the infielders in particular was pretty well known. Eric giving you the Gold Glove and Mark Ellis. Have you heard from any of those guys? I'm curious about your connections with the players on those A's teams. RON WASHINGTON: Well, I heard from Mark once we won the division. I haven't actually heard from him since. Through a third party I heard from Eric Chávez. Those guys have their life. I know that wherever they are, they're certainly wishing me well, and I feel it. Although I haven't received a phone call. So if you're looking at this, Eric, call me. (Laughter). But no, I feel it. The years I spent in Oakland is mainly the reason I'm sitting up here today. We influenced a lot of players. The media on that side of the Bay felt like Ron Washington could probably manage, and they began to put my name out there. I began to get some interviews, and I got lucky with Texas. I owe a lot to that side of the Bay. There's a lot of coaches that went through Oakland that became managers, and I'm just in that line. Q. There's many Latin Americans on your roster, more than ten at this specific moment. You played in Latin America, how much of that experience playing down there helped you to handle such a diverse team? Because they like to play aggressive baseball, too. RON WASHINGTON: Well, you know, my take on that is baseball is baseball, it doesn't matter where it's played. I try to give respect to every American, no matter their nationality, and the only thing I expect out of my players, whether they're Latin, Oriental or American, is that they come and respect the game, respect their teammates, be on time and play as hard as they can. I didn't have a problem with my Latin guys because they understand what we wanted out of them, and the majority of them came through our organization, and they had a chance to be there. And then when you add a guy like Vlad, who has such presence, he makes sure that everything stays in control. So I haven't changed what I expect out of any of my players. I think more than anything else, they want the same thing, and it was an easy transition to have that many guys on our roster, and plus, they can play. Q. At what point in the year did you know C.J.'s move in the rotation was going to work and also it was going to last? What did you need to see him from him? RON WASHINGTON: Well, I knew it was going to work in Spring Training when he took the job. We didn't give C.J. that job, he took it in Spring Training. Knowing the work ethic and the confidence he has in himself and the way he goes about his business preparing things would work out. The only drawback I had on C.J. was if he can pound the strike zone enough, and he proved that he could. Other than that, he proved to us in Spring Training that he was in the starting rotation to stay. Of course, being the first time that he had to go through the situation of maybe making 31 or 32 starts, of course there were questions. But he set those questions aside because every time things got tough, he got tougher. And that's the makeup of my club. Q. If my timeline is correct, I think you were up with the Dodgers in September of '77 but I don't think you were on the World Series roster. The '86 Twins you were an integral player but got cut the year they went to the World Series. I wonder if there's some feeling of attainment. You said it hasn't sunk in yet, but you're sitting there with "World Series" on the side of your cap. I wonder if it's been so far a different experience for you. RON WASHINGTON: In '77 when I got called up to the Dodgers, I was a young pup. That was my first time having a call-up, and the Dodgers had already arranged for myself and Jeff Leonard to go to winter ball. So when the season started they sent us to Arizona to prepare for three days to go to winter ball. That was my first time in Mexico. That's why I wasn't on that roster. I never really thought about being on that roster. I was only thinking about the opportunity to go play winter ball. What a fool I was. And as far as Minnesota goes, I was the last cut in Spring Training. I had one of the best springs I thought I could have had. They made some trades at the end of the Spring Training for Al Newman, and they decided they wanted to go young, and they went with Al Newman. I got picked up by Baltimore, and it got away from me. But I had a lot to do in the way of those guys maturing over there because I was in that organization when the Hrbeks and Kirby Pucketts and Gary Gaettis came in as young men. And I think I helped them to fashion their thought processes about the game, their attitudes about the game. Their ability was their ability, but I think I had a big presence in how they handled themselves on the baseball field and how they went about their business. So I still felt like I was a part of it, although I wasn't on that team, and I was so happy for those guys because Mr. Griffin cleaned house in '82 and brought all those young kids up from Double-A. We lost a lot of ballgames in the process, but that same group of guys that lost 100 games a couple years in a row ended up winning that World Series, and I felt like I was a part of it, although I wasn't there. I just went on about my business, and I got six or seven more years in the Big Leagues after I left Minnesota, so my career certainly wasn't finished, and I'm very fortunate that I ended up with the club that I have right now that fought through a lot, and now we're able to play for the World Series. Q. Can you elaborate a little bit on your time in Oakland and maybe how that shaped you and why you were maybe better prepared to be a manager at the end of that time than you were a few years before? RON WASHINGTON: Well, once again, I talk about moment. My only focus at the time when I was in Oakland was to try to be the best third base coach that I can be and be the best infield instructor that I can be. But you know, along the way, you get questions about the game of baseball and you answer those questions, not that you're second-guessing anyone. You answer from your heart the way you feel. And through that, a lot of questions that I was asked, wow, it came to light, and people began to say, wait a minute, this guy is not too bad because I took care of my business, and my business was third base and infield. But I didn't miss anything that went on that was other people's job, either, and as a baseball person, that's what you do. Once you think you know everything in this game, then you need to get out. But I tried to learn as much about every part of baseball that I possibly could. It took me to become a manager to really learn more about pitching, but all the other parts of the game I learned. And I got all of that in Oakland because we had a group of kids that were kids that believed, that went out there and every day all they wanted to do was go on the baseball field and play baseball, and they did that. That clubhouse was solid, and each time we lost someone, someone stepped up. One year it was Jason Giambi, one year was Miguel Tejada, one year it was Eric Chávez, one year it was Hudson, Mulder, Zito. We just kept going and whoever came into that clubhouse got involved in what that clubhouse was about. And it was about going on the field every day trying to beat your opponent on every single day, and it didn't matter how you did it, the feeling right now I got right here in Texas, and I got that from Oakland. Q. (No microphone.) RON WASHINGTON: They believe in the three-run bomb, they believe in on-base percentage, and there wasn't nothing wrong with that because we won like that. I'm just a wide-open guy. End of FastScripts |
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