BALTIMORE -- We all love the stories about position players pitching.

Well, not all of us.

Sparky Anderson didn't. He managed 4,030 games in the major leagues and never once put a position player on the mound. He thought it was wrong, that it made a joke out of the game, and he was absolutely determined not to do it.

So is Ron Washington.

"I want a position player to be a position player," the Rangers manager said Monday. "Pitching is a pitcher's job."

Washington wasn't being critical of Orioles manager Buck Showalter and Red Sox manager Bobby Valentine, both of whom felt forced into using position players to pitch in Sunday's 17-inning game in Boston. Orioles first baseman Chris Davis pitched two scoreless innings to get the win, with Red Sox outfielder Darnell McDonald taking the loss.

The Orioles and Red Sox played a 13-inning game Friday night, and neither team's starter made it through the fifth inning Sunday. By the 16th inning, when Davis pitched, Showalter's choices were to use Davis or to go to Brian Matusz, Monday's scheduled starter.

"I wasn't going to throw a whole pitching staff in disarray and jeopardize a guy who's throwing the ball real well," Showalter told reporters Sunday.

Washington knows the feeling. He remembers a game where pitching coach Mike Maddux was urging him to get Davis (then a Ranger) prepared to pitch. Washington said he thought about it but decided against it.

While he won't guarantee that he'd never be in a spot to use a position player, he is strongly opposed to it.

"I hope I never have to do it," he said.

The funny thing is that fans love it, and most position players seem to, as well.

Davis got a standing ovation from Orioles fans before his first at-bat Monday night against the Rangers. Before the game, center fielder Adam Jones joked that Davis is the Orioles' "secret weapon," and other Orioles players talked about who would pitch next.

Showalter already had that worked out. He said that Nick Markakis would have pitched the 18th inning if Sunday's game had gone on, then said that he even planned to bring in the left-handed Markakis to replace the right-handed Davis if switch-hitting Jarrod Saltalamacchia came up in the 17th.

Markakis was a big-time pitcher in junior college. Davis also pitched in junior college, where he was his team's closer.

"But we blew everyone out, so I didn't really need to pitch much," he said.

The Rangers also have a position player who pitched. Mitch Moreland was good enough that the Rangers once had him go to instructional league to work at pitching, with the possibility that he'd make a career of it.

Moreland said Monday that he wouldn't mind getting a chance to pitch in a major-league game someday.

Washington agreed that Moreland would be the most likely Ranger position player to pitch. But he said he'll do anything he can to make sure it doesn't happen.

As for Davis, the obvious question was when he'll pitch again.

His answer: "In all honesty, I don't ever want to do that again."

He's a hitter, not a pitcher. And as Washington said, pitching is a pitcher's job.