When I heard someone say recently that their son had quit sports because he got nothing out of it…I think I know why. They’re being taught to accept losing graciously, instead of playing to win.
My Christmas Eve was made much better with a phone call from a friend in Indiana…a former basketball, baseball, and football official who now enjoys what he called last week, “watching the world become a better place for everyone.”
That better place for my kids than it was for me.
We’re all waiting for that, of course. Hope in one hand, reality in the other.
Without fully identifying Pat, I’ll share an officiating war story about him that’s timeless…working with me as a substitute umpire in the American Association (AAA), sometime around 1980.
On a night in Indianapolis one of the umpires in our crew had ejected Oklahoma City manager Lee Elia, then listened to his post-ejection rant before walking away. But Elia wasn’t through and immediately started for Pat, because he was new and unfamiliar. He mistook him for an easy mark.
“Tell me why you guys threw me out,” Elia demanded.
“Because you’re a nuisance,” said Pat. “You’re a distraction. And people in the stands are tired of you. Your act is 30 seconds long, and when it’s over it’s over. High school coaches are more challenging than you. Now get out.”
We laughed about that, forty years after the fact, because Elia enjoyed a good ejection, as everyone once did in baseball – part of the culture of the game. But not anymore.
Then we talked about sports, and about the culture of contemporary sports that he maintains has made it predictable and uninspiring at the amateur level.
“There’s no passion for competition,” he said, now retired from officiating. “It’s obvious. And it’s obvious because no one’s afraid of getting beat. They’re taught it’s OK to lose. There’s no Butkus on the field. No one gets upset. All we talk about is sportsmanship, even if it means losing. We don’t understand sportsmanship – that a guy just kicked your butt, and he’s going to do it again if you don’t make him respect you. We tell teams that win, “good game”, without knowing what that means.”
It was just a conversation, but those words have a haunting quality about them, because it’s hard to prove that they’re not true. When I heard someone say recently that their son had quit sports because he got nothing out of it, I think I understand.
Talk to anyone who played high school football, or another sport fifty years ago, and they remember a decidedly different message about competition than the one we’re programming today. Listen to the PSA messages you hear at the state tournaments…that winning isn’t the most important thing, but how you play the game. Help someone else ‘finish’ the race, instead of you trying to ‘win’ the race!
“That’s a wonderful sentiment,” coaches have shared. “But it’s not competition. Where winning means opportunity and career – whatever that means to you – you’d better play with some passion, win or lose.”
From my own experience, most of the ejections I witnessed in baseball were an attempt by coaches and managers to get their own players to perform with greater passion. And there was a time when spectators were entertained by those 30 seconds of ‘entertainment’ that got Lee Elia tossed. Today, people cover their eyes and call it poor sportsmanship.
But Bobby Knight didn’t throw the chair because he was a bad sport. He threw it because his team was horrible against Purdue that night and he sacrificed his own image to make them understand that additional passion for competition was needed. Throwing a chair? Highly questionable, but it was Bobby Knight, who later maintained he couldn’t find his sport jacket to throw. It only added to the story, and he paid the price.
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When I was a high school and college baseball player pitchers didn’t throw inside to hitters because they were poor sports. They did it to upset them, distract, even intimidate, and to challenge their own competitive level. More often than not they were successful.
By comparison to competition then, today’s sports are lacking where it comes to even ‘conversation’ about passion for winning. Not that players and coaches don’t want to win, but we’re highly conscious if they say or do something deemed inappropriate.
There was a time, compared to today, when coaches told you exactly where you stood – a time when there were actually cuts in the roster if you couldn’t play. Now, cutting players who can’t play gets coaches fired. And there aren’t as many players as there once were to begin with. Some will tell you that kids don’t play because they’re not brought up with the sensation of competing, so sports is not that interesting to them.
One year former Yankees manager Casey Stengel told a top rookie prospect in spring training: “I think you’re going to hit .300 this year,” said Stengel, bringing a smile to the player’s face. “But you’re going to do it a thousand miles from New York. Get packed.”
Someone once asked former football coach John McKay what he thought of his team’s execution during a particularly poor showing on Sunday: “I’m in favor of it,” said McKay.
The great basketball coach at Springfield South, Wayne Wiseman, once laughed and told me about a 6’4″ kid who looked like a power forward, but wasn’t.
“His mom told him to let the coaches know he was willing to do anything,” said Wiseman. “After I saw him play I knew why she wanted him out of the house.”
Publisher Sonny Fulks writes OHSAA and Ohio State sports for Press Pros Magazine.com.
You tell people where they stand like that now and you’ll be in a school board meeting next week.
But if I could impart my own experience, as an athlete who had more passion to play than talent, I would encourage people to let their kids learn how to compete. Appreciate coaches who teach advantage, and attitude, if only small, because it doesn’t make you a dirty player or a cheat. It’s just a good life habit to have. Learn to find a way to win because it’s going to help you.
It’s more fun.
More interesting.
A better skill than saying “good game” in a handshake line…when you don’t know what it means.
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