Imagine a sports landscape in which there were no mistakes. Dave Johnson has done so, and what he sees isn’t pretty. The rallies go on forever, the score is endlessly tied, and there is no game. No sport. No thrill. Johnson, president-elect of the Minnesota State High School Coaches Association, has written a thoughtful piece […]
Today marks an astonishing anniversary in baseball history. On this date in 1951, the New York Giants lost a game, and fell 13 games behind the Brooklyn Dodgers with only seven weeks to go in the season. In baseball, being 13 games behind with only seven weeks to play usually means only one thing: Wait til […]
Last night comedian Don Rickles was a guest on Craig Ferguson’s talk show. Rickles is a legend who gained fame through his good-natured insults. Sure enough, the minute he got on the stage, he jabbed everyone in sight: the host, the audience, everyone. Pretty soon everyone in the building was in stitches. Rickles’ comedy is […]
Perhaps you’ve seen the video of a recent daredevil stunt in which a kayaker plunged over a 180-foot waterfall. This extreme sport says everything about how much you accomplish in your life and career. Warning: I am not telling you to go out and ride over a waterfall. However, it is a good idea — […]
Teammates love to tell stories of Rickey Henderson, a superstar character who is to be inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame today in Cooperstown, N.Y. Henderson, for instance, once neglected to cash a $1 million check. Instead, he had it framed. But one incident makes perfect sense. It came one day after he struck […]
You know the old saying, “You’re known by the company you keep.” It’s only partially true. What’s closer to the truth is: “You’re DEFINED by the company you keep.” There is another saying: “You are the average of the five people with whom you spend the most time.” For instance, if you hang around a […]
Last night my friend, Dr. Rob Gilbert, made a bit of a pilgrimage. He went to nearby Montclair, N.J., to walk past the childhood home of astronaut Buzz Aldrin. On the 40th anniversary of the day man first walked on the moon, Dr. Gilbert, a sports psychologist, stared at Aldrin’s home. “To look at the […]
Hall of Fame baseball player Reggie Jackson once said, “As long as you have a bat in your hand, you can write the story.” Jackson certainly did that in the 1971 All-Star Game, when he smashed a ball off a transformer on the right field roof. He also wrote many a story in the World […]
If you’re like most people, you enjoy hearing stories of greatness. You like to learn about people who overcame adversity and who, against all odds, created success for themselves. What you may not realize is that those stories need not be about others. They can be about you. And — this is the amazing part […]
The more I coach, the more I believe that mistakes hold the key to your destiny. Mistakes represent a fork in the road. At this fork, you decide whether to be frustrated or fascinated. You decide whether you will lose or learn. You decide whether you will quit or grow. A blog from the Positive […]