Athletic greatness comes in all shapes and all sizes.

It doesn't come naturally, but is achieved from hard work diligence and adversity along the journey.

There's opportunity and there's always struggle.

There is triumph and there is defeat.

And there is always a story behind the glory.

For New Orleans native Ron Washington, there is a ten year major league playing career that he is best known for his role as coach and manager.

He's as positive a guy that you've ever seen.

I would have loved to have the opportunity to play for a guy like that, and he's been doing this for a long time.

He's been a very successful, very successful baseball manager.

When you look at Ron Washington, you see someone from New Orleans, from the inner city that made it out, that can offer a wealth of knowledge and create a huge impact.

You will now meet New Orleans, his own Ron Washington, a baseball lifer who has influenced some of the best professional baseball players in the country and is still coaching at the highest level.

So tell me how a kid from inner city New Orleans becomes a ten year major league professional and manages the Texas Rangers very successfully and now is the third base coach for the world champion Atlanta Braves from a couple of years ago.

What a journey.

Dedication and belief.

Those two words, believing in something and put action to it.

That's what it's about.

I was dedicated to baseball and I believe I could play.

And at no time in my career when I was playing or coaching or managing that, I didn't believe that we could and we did.

So it was dedication and belief.

So when you're six, eight, ten, 12 years old, was baseball the preferred game in your neighborhood?

Was it basketball?

Was it something else?

Well, baseball was the preferred game in my neighborhood for me because I came up in the Desire projects in New Orleans, and the projects were bricks so I could throw the ball up against the wall and use my glove and perfect what I was doing.

And then, you know, we had guys in the neighborhood used to play strikeout a lot.

We used to find old brooms, break the mops off, break brooms off of them and use those rubber balls to strike you out.

But you could never get it past Ron Washington.

Do you know how many old timers in the audience right now are going.

I remember that.

I remember 60 years ago when I was a kid.

That's what we did.

Yeah.

You know, like I said, I was dedicated because the game of baseball, I found out I love it as a young kid and it was an individual sport.

But you play it within the team concept.

But it was you against someone.

And as a youngster, all I ever did was try to compete.

You got your first big break in a Kansas City Royals.

I'm going to call it a tryout camp and one of very, very few across the nation and thousands and thousands who participated to go on and play professionally.

What sort of opportunity was there there for you and how did you attack that opportunity?

Well, I take that opportunity the same way I take that opportunity when I was on the street playing baseball.

I didn't look at it any differently because I didn't know anything differently.

I didn't feel like I needed to impress anyone.

When I went to play professional baseball because I could play.

So I just went there and I played.

And sometimes obstacles in your way and those obstacles, you don't get out your way very easily.

So you got to keep digging and keep digging and keep digging and not believe that you failed because when you fail, you're done.

So I always looked at failure as a learning experience.

I always looked at failure as temporary because I'm not a failure.

What I'm doing in the moment I might fail at it, but if I keep doing it, I won't fail no more repetition.

That's the joy of baseball, the repetition, the repeating it over and over and over and over.

And if you don't know much about baseball, it'll be boring to you.

But it's not boring at all.

And it never was boring to me.

And I just kept at it and kept at it and kept at it.

And I didn't know it, but I was a blessed person.

So your ten year major league career, which is three times longer than the average comes to a close.

Transition me into your coaching career, how that came about.

Who gave you a break?

Who believed in Ron Washington?

Well, in 1987, I was still playing.

I got a call from a coach by the name of Bob Floyd.

He's still in the New York Mets organization now.

And he said, start talking to me about coaching.

I said, Hey, Bob, I'm still playing.

You say what?

I'm just trying to get ahead of things.

When you retire, I'm letting you know if you want a coach, I want you to come to the Mets.

So when I retired, I had gotten an offer from Cleveland general manager, that when I decide I'm not going to play anymore to give them a call, well, I call Cleveland first.

And he tried to send me somewhere else.

He said, Well, I think the White Sox.

Whoa, I didn't ask you to refer me to anyone.

You told me when I retired.

Call you.

I'm calling you.

Well, we don't have none.

That's all.

That's all.

That's it.

So when I put down the phone, I called Bob Floyd in a New York Mets organization, and he gave me a coaching job.

He became known as developer of some of the game's top young infielders in the 1990s and early 2000s while coaching the Mets and the A's.

He would always come back.

He was always available.

He was available to talk to about the game.

He was available to our coaches.

He knew everybody.

He had time for everybody, as he still does.

Then in 2006, he was hired by the Texas Rangers as their field manager.

Washington, who took the Rangers to two World Series appearances, has a reputation as an enthusiastic, positive teacher of the game.

He's a baseball guy, right?

"Wash regimen" is what we call it.

Here is what we do it all out of your field as far as teaching on the field.

But more importantly, off the field for us is the mentorship.

You also had a coaching job in Oakland, and I want to everybody remembers every baseball fan remembers the Moneyball concept in the movie.

And Ron Washington in that movie was played by an actor by the name of Brant Jennings.

Give me a grade on Mr. Jennings.

His performance of you.

I thought he played a an A yes in the scenes.

You know, another thing is when you have a movie, you have things embellished.

They didn█t over embellish things.

A lot of stuff in that movie was true.

The scenes he had, the things that he was a part of.

It happened for real.

As a manager of the Texas Rangers, you came within a pitch of winning, of winning a world championship.

It didn't happen.

What was your reaction to that?

My reaction to that was it wasn't meant to be because as you just mentioned, we were there twice.

One pitch away and it got away from us.

It was disappointment, but I just felt like it.

Maybe it wasn't meant to be.

It wasn't meant to be.

Now it was meant to be.

Two years ago in Atlanta.

Yes.

And your emotions on getting to the top, something that thousands of players want to do, very few achieve.

What was it like to to to say I am a world champion?

It was awesome because it was my 52nd year at Go to show you how long it takes to be a champion.

Is there possibly another managerial position in Ron Washington's future?

Ron Washington wants a possible managerial opportunity in his career?

But he doesn't make that decision.

You know, I'm happy in Atlanta, and if I had to say I was chasing something in this game, I would say I'm chasing another manager's job.

But, you know, you have to.

It's not like you can campaign for it, not like you can fill out an application for someone gotta want you.

And, you know, hopefully they see that I still want to do it and I know I can win.

You know what I'm saying?

I but when you running things, it's not I.

You're just the leader and you've got to get followers.

I will put it like this.

I knew if I got an opportunity to manage again, I'll get some followers.

Washington is still teaching as the third base coach for the Atlanta Braves, finally getting his World Series championship ring in 2021.

Ron Washington's been a very special part of our success here with the Atlanta Braves.

He brings consistency every day.

You can set your watch and what time Wash comes through the door.

He is great with our players and teaching them the routine of being a major league player.

He also has given back to his hometown and the Major League Baseball Youth Academy by frequent appearances and contributions.

You know, you always come around Christmas break, which is our Christmas present, right as a staff, because we know Wash is coming in.

Usually with a couple of existing professional athletes, pro guys that can tell that story to a lot of these kids and they can look at him and see, okay, I do have a path.

These young kids have all of his talent, all of this skill set in.

They only get to show it for a little bit a while because we want them to be what we want them to be.

And we don't have enough patience to allow them to be what they will be with time, which is experience.

Experience is only something you get by going through it.

Knowledge you can get something by picking up your phone and finding something out.

You got knowledge, but that's not experience.

Experience is only going through it and we're not allowing these kids to go through it.

He has as much enthusiasm when he's out here working with a seven or eight year old than anyone is working with Von Grissom.

You don't have to wind him up and they look forward to it because they know that it will make a difference.

And what they're trying to do in the big leagues.

Manager.

Coach, Mentor.

Positive influence on people.

A success on and off the field.

All things that describe this baseball lifer.

EARNEST Congratulations on your induction into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame.

Thank you so much.

It's it's a blessing and I have to say that I've been blessed.

I really have.

From the time I can remember, I didn't know it then when I was a youngster.

But as you get older and you begin to learn things and know things and feel things and can sense things.

I've been blessed since I was born.