Ron Washington tested positive during 2009
The manager of Texas Rangers, Ron Washington, had tested positive for cocaine during the 2009 season as per recent reports.
“I did make a mistake and I regret that I did it”, Washington told Sportsillustrated.CNN.com by phone from Surprise, Arizona.
Washington rendered an apology that was accepted by the Rangers. He was retained on the assurance that he would not be repeating such kind of a mistake in the future.
From Sportsillustrated.cnn.com:
Major league managers, coaches and other clubhouse personnel have been subject to drug testing since 2008, when MLB adopted the measure as one of George Mitchell’s recommendations as part of his report regarding steroid and drug use in baseball. MLB mandates that any non-playing personnel who either fail a test or admit to drug use be subject to counseling and a substance-abuse program developed by a doctor approved by baseball. First-time offenders are generally not subject to punitive measures such as a suspension, pending the commissioner’s discretion, and their names are not made public. (Tests are administered randomly once a year to all non-playing personnel who work around the clubhouse, which also includes trainers, clubhouse and equipment managers, massage therapists and traveling secretaries.) So by calling MLB headquarters even before his test results were known, Washington was subjecting himself to the substance-abuse program regardless of the results.
“I cannot comment on anyone in the program unless it’s a performance-enhancing substance issue,” MLB spokesman Pat Courtney wrote in an e-mail to SI.com on Tuesday.
The Rangers were initially quite alarmed at cocaine admission of their manager but retained him after Washington said that this was a one-time transgression and would not be repeated again.
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