Walton reflects on success

Injury is the only thing to ever keep Jerome Walton from doing what he’s wanted to do in baseball since he was a youngster in Newnan, Ga.
Walton, the 1989 National League Rookie of the Year, wouldn’t change anything, despite having his career cut short by a series of injuries.
“I had a good career,” he said in a Wednesday conversation. “I would’ve liked for it to have lasted longer, but, no, I wouldn’t change anything.“
For the record, Walton played 10 years in the major leagues with the Chicago Cubs, California Angels, Cincinnati Reds, Atlanta Braves, Baltimore Orioles and Tampa Bay Rays. He batted .269 during his career.
Walton looked like anything but a future major leaguer the summer after he graduated from Newnan High School. At 6-foot-1, he looked more like a beanpole than a ballplayer.
After having drawn little if any attention from any college baseball coach, Walton came to Enterprise State Junior College for a tryout, and the rest, as they say, is history.
“I knew how to play the game when I was in high school,” Walton said. “I thought I knew all I needed to know, but I didn’t. I’d just been getting by on athletic ability.
“Coach Ronnie Powell gave me a scholarship and he tweaked what I was doing and made a big difference in my game.“
Walton hit a woeful .190 as a freshman outfielder/pitcher, but with Powell’s guidance and his own hard work, and despite existing on little but tuna sandwiches, he became a .430-plus hitter as a Boll Weevil sophomore.
He also pitched a complete game and earned ESJC’s only victory in the 1986 state tournament played at Montgomery’s Paterson Field.
Fast as greased lightning, Walton drew the attention of the Chicago Cubs organization — as an outfielder — was taken in the ’86 draft and left Enterprise for rookie league baseball in Woodfield, Va.
In 1987, Walton played in Peoria, Ill., in A ball, and in 1988 was in Pittsfield, Mass., then the Cubs’ AA affiliate.
Walton made the Cubs’ 1989 roster in spring training; 162 regular-season games later, he was named the league’s top newcomer.
He co-wrote a book about his whirlwind rise to fame and fortune, and settled in for what he felt would be a long career, based in no small part on the fact, then as now, as the old baseball adage goes, “speed don’t have no slumps.“
But Walton’s body didn’t cooperate, and it still isn’t. He continues to recover from an accident suffered in August 2008.
“I fell off a ladder while trimming some tree limbs and broke my leg really bad,” Walton said. “I’ve had several operations and have two more to go before it’s fixed. It was so bad that at one point they told me they were going to have to take the leg off.”
That would’ve been unfortunate not only for Walton, his wife of 15 years, Michele, and children Jarmar, Jerrell, Jalen and Mikayla, but also for young baseball and softball hopefuls in Atlanta, and possibly even for their counterparts in Enterprise.
“I’ve worked with a lot of youngsters over the years, and have sent some down to Enterprise, Walton said, naming Jonathan Sholar, who enjoyed a productive season at Enterprise-Ozark Community College this season, as one of his most notable pupils.
“I really want to have my own baseball school,” Walton said. “Atlanta is a hotbed of baseball talent, but there’s so much competition among baseball schools here that I’ve thought I really wouldn’t mind moving back to Enterprise and putting one in there.
“I understand there’s a lot of travel ball and a lot of league baseball and softball going on down your way, and I’m serious, I wouldn’t mind coming down that way again to live.”
Prior to his August injury, Walton was coaching a travel team with Marquis Grissom, a 17-year Major Leaguer and Atlanta native.
“Hopefully, my leg will be well so I can get back into coaching this fall, but my dream has always been to have my own school, and I know there’s a lot of talent in the Enterprise area.
“I’ve been blessed with the ability to watch someone hit, throw, and field and be able to find those things that just need tweaking, like Coach Powell did with me. I do not believe every hitter in the line-up should have the same, exact swing.“
Evidence Walton is a good teacher currently exists in the Major Leagues.
“I had been sent to the minor leagues by the Florida Marlins in 1989, and while I was there, they sent Derrek Lee to AAA for a week,” Walton explained. “He was really struggling, and we got to talking and I picked up on some minor things; he listened, made the changes, and hit 5-6 homeruns, which is phenomenal for a week, was called back up, and never played in the minors again.“
Lee, a first baseman, is a 13-year Major League veteran.
“A couple of years ago, I told a friend of mine that story,“Walton said. “And he didn’t believe it, so when Derek was in Atlanta during the season, we went to a game, went down to the dressing room, and I told my buddy to ask him who helped him turn his career around.
“Derrek quickly said, ’Jerome Walton!’“
Walton is itching to get back into baseball.
“What I want to do from now on is to teach kids what I know about baseball and fast-pitch softball,” he concluded. “I can keep on teaching private lessons, but I really want to open a baseball school.“