Category: Sports

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Foreword Thinking

Growing up I played a lot of golf with three lifelong friends. In 1980, the hottest summer on record before this one, we’d tee off at first daylight – 6 a.m. – to beat the heat. Those were great times and I have lasting memories of our outings on the links. Sadly, in October 1982, one of our foursome died in a car accident.

The following summer, the three of us left behind decided to start a golf tournament to honor our friend. The first outing had 12 players. Over the next decade it steadily grew, and we typically had 88 participants. During years 13-23, another good friend took the reins and did a great job. Through it all, we raised more than $100,000 for a scholarship fund at our high school in Fort Worth. After the 2005, tournament, everyone knew the time had come to end it.

Then one year ago this week, another friend reached out and asked if we would allow him to restart it. “That was such a wonderful chance for everyone to get together every year,” he said. “I’d be willing to do all the work, if you guys will tell me what needs to happen.” Of course, we said yes, and on Sunday 40 of our long-time players will tee it up in the 24th Paul Knippel Memorial.

I turned 23 the week of that first tournament. Everyone who played was within a few years of my age. Now we’re on either side of 50. This time, my 17-year-old son is playing with me, along with my 21-year-old nephew and my brother. By grace, those of us in the Class of ’78 have lived a lot of life Paul never had the opportunity to experience. Somewhere, he’ll be smiling as we gather again. Life passes quickly. Make sure you reconnect with those who matter.

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Winning Formula

Since we moved to Houston in 1998, the only local sports highlights were when the Astros played in the National League Championship Series twice and made it to the World Series once. Rockets? One playoff series win in 13 seasons. Texans? Still mired in mediocrity after nine years. Meanwhile, in the past eight months, my hometown – DFW – has seen the Rangers play in the World Series and crowned the Mavericks as NBA Champions. That’s great for my family and friends there… and I’m enjoying it from afar.

Listening to and reading commentary of media experts this morning about what happened to the South Beach dream team – for instance, Colin Cowherd on ESPN Radio said, “I honestly thought Miami was better last night with LeBron James on the bench” – it’s clear Dirk Nowitzki and the deepest roster in the league outplayed the Heat’s three highly paid All Stars.

Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh and LeBron joined together last summer with the goal to win multiple championships. Number one will have to wait another year. As Michael Rosenberg wrote on SI.com: “The self-proclaimed King wanted it to be easy. His company’s logo should be a cart in front of a horse.” LeBron disappeared in the fourth quarter of every game. He’ll have the next four months to develop his post play and figure out how to do more when the basketball is in someone else’s hands

The Heat proved it’s hard to buy your way to success. Its travails serve as a lesson to business leaders that you need everyone on your team working together to become a champion. It took Dirk 13 years to lift that trophy. Time will tell whether the Big Three ever stand on the podium with smiles on their faces… or if this great experiment turns out to be the Big Mistake.

Note: Tomorrow at 1 p.m. EDT, I’ll appear on Insights Live, an Internet radio show, to share how to get everyone on your team pulling in the same direction. Here’s a link if you’d like to join us: http://bit.ly/keUIj4

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Powerful Prose

You may have seen the series of insurance commercials in which a Rod Serling-type announcer asks, “Could switching to Geico really save you 15% or more on car insurance?” In a current iteration, he then inquires, “Is the pen mightier than the sword?” After a ninja displays some slick sword work, the camera cuts to a man in martial arts clothing signing for an overnight delivery. He opens the box, pulls out an electronic device and zaps his adversary to the ground.

Posting a comment in 140 characters on Twitter doesn’t take much longer than that television spot. Unfortunately, sometimes the person tweeting doesn’t pause that long to ask, “How will this look if it shows up on the evening news?” Pittsburgh Steelers running back Rashard Mendenhall caused quite a stir last week – and was dropped by sponsors – after he tweeted comments questioning Osama bin Laden’s guilt in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

In this fast-paced world of instant communication, it’s easier than at any time in history to state an opinion that quickly circles the globe. Unfortunately, not having the discipline to consider in advance the potential impact of your comments could lead to big regrets. The Moral of the Mendenhall Mess: Think before you tweet. Otherwise you might end up in full-contact self-defense.

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Denying Eyes

The NFL draft begins tonight – which means a few young men barely of drinking age will wear $1,000 suits and smile broadly for the ESPN cameras, rejoicing that they are instant millionaires… and fortunate not to be selected by the Oakland Raiders.

A peculiarity of this annual rite of football passage is how personnel directors and draft experts often skip right past a player’s four-year record of success on the field and downgrade him because a 40-yard dash time was one-tenth of a second slow. Similarly, they’ll elevate someone who delivered average game results to near superstar status because he excelled in the 3-cone drill.

“Yeah, I know he set rushing records down there in Florida, but he’s too small to compete at the next level and he’s a step slow. He might have a brief career as a backup. That’s why we project a low second-round selection for Emmitt Smith.”

A similar approach for determining potential results occurs in our education system. This week here in Texas students are enduring the annual TAKS test – a standardized assessment that for some determines whether they advance to the next grade.

While the intentions are good – see what students know – there are two inherent problems with this tactic. First, teachers spend an inordinate amount of time ‘teaching to the test’ because they are judged on how well their class performs. Schools hold TAKS pep rallies throughout the year to motivate and encourage kids. Second, students miss out on the opportunity to broaden their learning, because, as one of our child’s teachers said, ‘There isn’t enough time for that with all this TAKS stuff.’

Instead of judging success on whether kids know the methods and tricks for answering multiple-choice questions, education leaders should measure how well their students are prepared for futures in this fast-changing world.

Once that’s accomplished, perhaps they will do away with the SAT as the biggest determining factor for college acceptance. From my experience – both as a graduate and the father of a student at the University of Texas – how you perform one Saturday during your senior year of high school has little to do with your ultimate success in college.

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Unsolicited Generosity

Asking for donations may be one of the ‘least favorite’ things on my list. There’s just something about reaching out to people and requesting they make a contribution to one of my kids’ extracurricular activities that doesn’t inspire me. Yet, it’s one of those necessary evils… whether it was selling Girl Scout Cookies or wrapping paper when our kids were younger, I always had a ‘not another one’ attitude about the approach.

That’s why when we attended a meeting about a summer league team for my varsity basketball playing son – and the mom organizing everything said, “We’ll need to ask for donations or raise money for uniforms” – I cringed with anxiety and thought, ‘I kinda hoped we were past that phase.’

Yet being a good rules follower and helper guy, I suggested to my wife that we needed to reach out to establishments where we spend a lot of money and ask for their help. So through email and in-person visits, we requested donations from our dentist of 12 years, car repair place where we’ve been loyal customers for a decade and favorite two restaurants (one fast-casual and the other upscale).

What were the results? I’m thrilled to report four-for-four. These small business owners made a nice contribution – even knowing the reach for their advertising dollars would be minimal. One followed up with an email to Kathy that said, “Thank you for thinking of me.” I was so surprised by their responses that I decided Success Handler, LLC also needed to write a check.

There are two lessons here: 1) Never shy away from asking… you never know how much someone might want to help; and, 2) When a parent or organization makes a request of your business, catch them off guard by saying ‘Yes!’ They already have enough folks who will decline.

One other thing is certain: we’ll remain loyal customers of those four service providers for years. So they’ll end up way ahead regardless of whether anyone else becomes a customer after seeing their names on the back of our warm-up jerseys.

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