September 2024 ~
It’s not that Ron Wold (Jackson, 1981) minds talking about his accomplishments as a three-sport high school athlete. To be sure, he’s plenty proud of the many achievements that in 2015 earned him a spot in the PIL Hall of Fame.
But all things considered, Wold would rather talk about the accomplishments he helped other young athletes achieve several years after he had stopped competing himself. Like the five state Little League championships he coached teams to in the 2000s. Or the fiery girls’ lacrosse teams he led, one of which took fourth in state despite him not really knowing a lacrosse stick from a pogo stick when he started.
Or all the other kids he coached in football, wrestling and girls basketball over 25-plus years, many of whom, he hopes, are still benefiting from his influence the same way he has from the likes of his own coaches and fellow inductees Mike Clopton and the late Jerry Lyons. Not to mention influences like his father and late older brother, Bruce, both of whom wrestled and, wittingly or not, set a high bar and set of expectations for Wold as a youth.
“If you were a Wold, you were a wrestler. That was pretty much a requirement to be in the family,” Ron muses.
Wold grew up in the Multnomah area of southwest Portland and came by his competitive streak early on, much of that the result of having to hold his own in games with a brother, two years his senior, and all his friends.
“Our neighborhood was full of kids, and you could always tell where everybody was at because that was where all the bikes were,” Wold says.
Wold’s dad was a Little League coach, so he spent much of his childhood at Alpenrose, either playing or hanging out watching games in something of a foreshadowing of his own future Little League coaching career.
“I remember playing in a Mt. Sylvania all-star game at Alpenrose and Coach Clopton showed up and brought (fellow coach and 2008 Hall of Fame inductee) Mike Bubalo,” Wold recalls. “I was more interested in talking to them than my own coach.”
Wold and his friends played sports year-round. He took up football in sixth grade then, when all his buddies played basketball, got started on his life as a wrestler. That was the sport he’d earn four letters in once he got to Jackson, becoming elite as a junior and senior. He won PIL championships at 168 pounds both years and cruised through his senior season undefeated as captain of the Jackson team.
He was no less successful as a middle linebacker (three letters, 1st Team All-PIL and Honorable Mention All-State as well as team captain as a senior) and as a centerfielder (three letters, 1st Team all PIL and Honorable Mention All-State as a senior).
His feats earned high praised from the legendary Lyons, who once called Wold “one of the best athletes I’ve ever coached.”
Even with all the athletics acclaim, Wold refers to himself back then as “kind of an academic guy,” and he has the additional high school honor of Multnomah Club Scholar Athlete award to prove it. “That was really cool; it was a big deal to me,” he says.
That award and the hard work required to achieve it were clearly top of mind for Wold’s father when his son’s high school career was nearing its end.
“I had received wrestling scholarship offers from Eastern Oregon and Southern Oregon, but Dad told me if I continued wrestling in college, he wasn’t going to provide any financial support. He knew that if I tried to wrestle, I wouldn’t have been able to be successful as a student. My brother had wrestled for a year at Eastern and he couldn’t make it. So, my dad told me, ‘When you go to college, you are going to focus on academics if you want my help.’ That was the smartest thing he could have done for me.”
Eschewing the scholarship offers, Wold wound up at Oregon State, where he enrolled as a pre-med student. “My goal was to be a doctor,” he says. “That lasted all of one quarter, or until I had to take organic chemistry.”
Wold did an about face and decided to pursue a degree in engineering and a career in which he could take advantage of his math skills. “I was pretty good at math, and it was pretty obvious that was my calling,” he says.
After earning his degree in 1985, Wold stepped right into a job with Mentor Graphics, where he had interned in college. He worked there for eight years, before moving on to a couple other opportunities, including a start-up company and another small firm that eventually was purchased by Mentor, putting him, for a while, right back where he started. Today he manages 75 employees as an engineering director for Siemans.
But Wold would still rather talk about his life as a coach and family man. He met his wife, Karen, at OSU, and they’ve raised three children, Austin, 32, Allie, 30, and Hannah, 18. His coaching career started when Austin started playing Little League.
“I loved it,” he says.
Wold’s teams were winners from the get-go, but the year his 9-year-old teams not only beat all the 10-year-old teams but also won the league sportsmanship award was when he became officially “hooked.”
In his 26 years coaching, Wold won 14 league championships and five state titles, the highlight being the 2005 Murrayhill Little League major team that steamrolled through the state playoffs, “10-running” all four of its opponents en route to the Northwest Region championships in San Bernardino.
Wold’s squad wound up falling just short of making the Little League World Series that year, losing a semifinal game to a team from Hawaii that was the eventual World Series champion.
As successful as his baseball teams were (“If anyone wants to hear me talk baseball, I’m ready to talk,” he says), Wold is equally proud of the teams he coached in other sports. “I became certified as a high-school lacrosse coach and I’m very proud of my teams. Anyone who says girls aren’t as competitive as boys doesn’t have a clue.”
Wold has plenty of fond memories of his high school days…competing at Jackson with five other teammates who are in the PIL Hall of Fame…playing football games at PGE park…the time Coach Lyons played Bruce out of position at fullback and inserted the sophomore Ron at tailback so the Wold brothers could play a series together.
Those memories aren’t going anywhere. But if you want to get Ron really talking, ask him about the memories he helped all the kids he coached over the years make.
Do you know Ron Wold? If you’d like to reconnect, he can be reached at [email protected].
Photo: Ron Wold (Jackson, 1981) with two of his kids, Allie and Austin
~ Profile written by Dick Baltus (Wilson, 1973)
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