Yogi

October 27, 2015

We lost a treasure when Yogi Berra died last month at the age of 90.

I hope a lot of people attended his funeral. After all, it was Yogi who said, “Always go to other peoples’ funerals, otherwise they won’t come to yours.”

Yogi had an intriguing mind for math. It was he who told us to “Pair up in threes.” He informed us that “A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.” He said, “Baseball is 90 percent mental and the other half is physical.” And, “You better cut the pizza in four pieces because I’m not hungry enough to eat six.”

Yogi was a sage observer of everyday life. In fact, he told us “You can observe a lot just by watching.” He observed that “No one goes there nowadays, it’s too crowded.” And, “It gets late early.”

Of course, Yogi ought to have known a lot about baseball, a sport in which he excelled and enjoyed unprecedented and unduplicated success as catcher for 10 World Series championship teams. He was an 18-time All-Star; but with characteristic humility, Yogi confessed, “In baseball, you don’t know nothing.”

While wise about many things, Yogi wasn’t correct about everything. When he said, “It ain’t over til it’s over,” he was wrong. It ain’t ever going to be over for Yogi.

And yet, without Yogi, “The future ain’t what it used to be.”

Balance

May 12, 2015

Recently, there has been a lot of sports talk banter, as well as texting, tweeting and blogging, about the preferred value that major college football coaches place on the multi-sport high school athletes during the recruiting process.

Ohio State’s Urban Meyer tweeted that 42 of his first 47 signed recruits at OSU were multi-sport high school athletes. Utah’s football coaching staff followed with a report that 37 of 47 players on their two-deep roster last season played at least two sports in high school. Other programs have produced similar statistics.

College coaches from coast to coast report a preference for high school athletes who have competed in multiple seasons and who have developed, for example, greater quickness and agility during wrestling or basketball season, or better speed during track season.

Against these preferences are the pressures of youth sports organizations which program year-round as well as the misguided impressions of parents who believe single-sport focus is essential to obtaining a college athletic scholarship. Escalating college costs add fuel. And sometimes nonfaculty high school coaches who are hired for a single sport overemphasize the single-sport experience in students’ lives.

Those who lead school sports know the score – the foolishness of chasing college financial aid on the playing field. The chances of getting any financial aid based on participation in a single sport – much less a full “scholarship” – are extremely low. It’s closer to a gamble than a good investment.

As is the case with so much in life, good balance is best.