As someone with a math and science background and an engineering degree I always kind of poopooed the concept of “soft skills” and communication. In my job as a consultant I have definitely learned a lot more about soft skills than I have hard technical skills.
Effective communication is one thing I have focused on the most. I think there are three easy keys to get started. The first two are just to speak loudly and confidently. The third change is a change in the content of what you say not just how you speak and that is to be as specific and precise as possible. This is ESPECIALLY true in email where tone is hard and sometimes impossible to detect.
The most concrete goal I can think of to set is to try to go one day, maybe just in writing and responding to emails, but don’t use any pronouns or ambiguous language. Don’t use He, She, Us, It, There, They, That, Thing, This, Those, Stuff, We, Them, Their, Kind of, or Sort of. Notice how much less confusion and how many less clarifying questions and email responses you get. Using ambiguous language and pronouns is more efficient in the immediate but is largely more inefficient in the long run. Just a thought.
-hj
Written by Hujo on April 17th, 2009 with no comments.
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About a year and a half ago I was working on a project in Indiana and some co-workers were talking about starting a pool to buy Powerball tickets. Powerball is a lottery that spans 30 states and has quite a higher payout than just the normal lottery. That being said its still a lottery or a “stupidity tax” or a “math tax” whatever you want to call it. Normally I like to consider math a strong suit of mine and I usually try to avoid voluntarily paying taxes based on my stupidity. But the payout WAS something like $235 million so I decided to play the lottery like an engineer.
I know, “Nerd Alert” *Michael Scott voice*.
So here’s how it went down. To play the lottery like an engineer you need to consider two things: when to play and how to play.
When to play
I think most people are probably familiar with how the lottery works. The cost of one entry and the probability of winning stay constant while the jackpot gradually increases until someone or multiple people win. People who took a high school statistics class probably remember the concept of expected value. Expected value is the average value that will result from an experiment as the number of trials approaches infinity. For instance, if you paid $1 in a coin flipping match and the payout was $2 (your original dollar plus a dollar) then the expected value would be $1. In other words if you played the game an infinite number of times half the times you would walk away with nothing and half the times you would walk away with $2 so the expected value is $1.
A bit more complicated example is if you participated in a raffle where you paid $1 for a ticket, the raffle has 1000 tickets, and the jackpot is $1000. The expected value here again is $1, 99.9% of the time you’ll walk away with nothing and 0.1% of the time you’ll walk away with $1000 so if you play an infinite number of times the total payout divided by the total number of trials will result in a $1 payout per trial average.
So of course my first step in determining whether or not I wanted to participate in this lottery pool was to calculate the expected value for that particular payout. My resolution was that if the expected value on the $1 Powerball ticket was $1 or greater I would give it a shot. The way the Powerball works is your $1 ticket allows you to pick five white balls from 1 to 59 and one additional red ball from 1 to 39.
Calculating the probability of hitting the jackpot is probably easier than you would expect. For the first white ball that is drawn you have a 5/59 chance of getting it right. Assuming you get that one right you have a 4/58 chance of getting the second white ball, 3/57 chance for the third, 2/56 for the fourth, and 1/55 for the fifth. For the red ball you have a 1/39 shot and to figure out the probability of combining all of those in one run you simply multiply (5/59)*(4/58)*(3/57)*(2/56)*(1/55)*(1/39)=1/195,249,054. So as long as the jackpot is greater than $195,249,054 than your expected value will be be greater than $1. In other words if you played the lottery an infinite number of times with these conditions and this payout you would make money. Actually the jackpot that results in an expected value of $1 is slightly less than that because there are multiple payouts, not just the jackpot, but that calculation is much more complicated.
The catch is the advertised jackpot is only really the jackpot if you are the sole winner. This leads me to how to play the lottery like an engineer.
How to play
My next step was to devise a strategy that would reduce the probability that if I won the lottery that I would share the same combination of numbers as any other participant. In short I tried to think of what the most “unlucky” combination of numbers would be. I put unlucky in quotes as a joke because no combination of 5 white balls and 1 red ball is anymore unlucky than another. As long as you completely fill out a lottery ticket there is no way to be “good” or “bad”. But again this is a “stupidity tax” so most people won’t get that. My strategy was to pick consecutive numbers. The majority of people who voluntarily participate in the “stupidity tax” would tell you that the probability of winning with a “4,18,32,44,58,*31*” ticket would be better than a “1,2,3,4,5,*6*” ticket when in fact the probabilities for each ticket are the exact same, 1/195,249,054 as we discovered earlier. But since the “stupidity tax” participant won’t pick consecutive numbers I have a better chance of being the sole winner if in fact I do win.
Now you can take this knowledge forward and play the lottery like an engineer.
-hj
Written by Hujo on March 22nd, 2009 with no comments.
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… and Texas has nobody to blame but Utah. Oh and the sixth Big XII tiebreaker rule…
“Last year, though, Texas’ strength of schedule ranked 14th nationally in USA Today’s Sagarin ratings, largely on the merits of the strength of the Big 12.
That might have been bolstered if a three-game series with Utah had not fallen through. Texas and Utah had a ‘letter agreement’ in 2000 on a series that would have played two games in Austin in 2007 and 2009 with an away game in Salt Lake City in 2008.
‘Before we got to the formal contract phase, Utah decided not to do it,” Worley said. “They indicated they’d rather not play.’
Utah finished 13-0 as the only unbeaten Division I-A football team in the country and was No. 2 behind BCS champion Florida in the final Associated Press poll. The Utes might have benefited from a game with Texas, because their strength of schedule was 56th, according to Sagarin. Texas and Utah have not talked about any dates since.”
Austin-American Statesman Link
Written by Hujo on January 17th, 2009 with no comments.
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This whole Big XII tiebreaker rule is quite the mess. We obviously didn’t Make Up Our Minds While All Emotions Are Under Control and so many fell in love with the bright shiny thing on national TV. I absolutely did not understand how OU had a case until yesterday’s Colin Cowherd show. His point was if OU barely beats Texas Tech then it truly is a three-way tie and then how do you decided that? But if OU goes out and kills Tech like they did then it becomes a two-way tie which OU loses. So OU is penalized for playing well in the Tech game. The whole thing is bogus as a result of the idiots that created this tiebreaker rule didn’t keep things objective at every turn and eventually it turned partially (66%) to a vote which isn’t objective at all… it’s figure skating.
So what objective measures should have broken the three-way tie?
There are two cliches coaches always say to players before games and during the season.
1. All that matters is that at the end of the game we have one more point than they do.
2. Conference play is the start of a new season, nothing that has happened so far matters for the positive or the negative in terms of our goals of winning a conference championship.
I believe those two things should be true as well.
This brings about two debates: 1. Should margin of victory matter and if so how much? 2. Should non-conference schedule matter in a conference race?
1. Margin of Victory
Margin of victory should potentially matter and be used as an objective tiebreaker as long as it has a low-cap. High school football the cap is 10 points, I think possibly you could stretch to 14 but no more. Some people are suggesting 21 but that’s too much. Too high of a cap encourages poor sportsmanship like we saw in the OU-OSU and the Texas Tech-Texas A&M games. OU was up 14 with less than a minute left. A single snap to QB Sam Bradford and a knee to the ground and the game is over. But with a 21 point cap system or even the BCS system we have today that’s not enough. Texas Tech is up 36-25 with less than a minute left and running no-huddle they punch it down to the goalline, they challenge the spot, lose the challenge, and then run another play to score. Again one knee to the ground and the game is over. Mack Brown meanwhile politicked off the field but was sportsmanlike perhaps to a fault on the field benching starters in the fourth quarters of games. Stoops and Leach took the high-road off the field but that wasn’t reflected in their coaching decisions on game day. A 66-28 OU win over Texas A&M shouldn’t be valued any more or less than a 49-9 Texas win over Texas A&M. Both teams got their points across and it should be mute.
2. Non-conference scheduling
Much has been made of the fact that there are 5 conferences that have divisions and a conference championship game and four of them use the BCS to eliminate the third team in a 3-way tie and then look at head-to-head. The other (Big XII) uses solely the BCS, although according to the Big XII commissioner that is likely to change after the season although it will be too late at that point. The majority of people are in favor of the way the majority of the conference’s tiebreaker rules work but even that system uses the BCS to eliminate the third team. The problem with using the BCS is that the BCS factors in non-conference games which shouldn’t be an input at all in determining a conference champion.
What if OU schedules Florida AT FLORIDA and loses yet Texas, Texas Tech, and OU are all 7-1 in Big XII play? Should OU be penalized for that? The message here seems to be schedule the best team you know you can beat. Sure OU beat TCU and Cincinnatti at home but should that be a factor in determining anything conference related? Also, are TCU and Cincinnatti really the jugernauts that OU is getting credit for beating? Any chance Texas or Texas Tech don’t beat TCU and Cincinnatti at their place?
Another factor that was overlooked, at it should as all non-conference should, is games against D 1-AA schools. Texas Tech played two and Oklahoma played one. How about OU playing the worst team in college football, Washington, the only winless school in the country?
These schedules are made 4-7 years in advance so determining who is going to be good that one year involves a bit of luck unless you schedule a Florida, USC, or Ohio State and even then there is a chance you can go wrong.
Texas scheduled Arkansas, easily the most distinguished program on any of the teams in the three-way tie’s non-conference schedules. This is a team that beat Texas in Austin their last trip down, a team that knocked off #1 LSU in Baton Rouge a year ago during their national championship run, a team that regularly plays in SEC Championship games which is routinely considered the toughest conference in the country. But Texas gets no credit for scheduling them because this one year they’re transitioning to a new coach they suck so that 52-10 beat down shouldn’t matter? If we are factoring in non-conference scheduling then it should matter. But again that in no way should be a factor.
The non-conference is the most unstructured scheduling in sports. As unstructured as college football is the Big XII’s conference schedule is as good as it gets. You play the 5 teams in your division every year alternating home and away. You play 3 of the 6 teams in the other division alternating home and away and then the next two years you play the other 3 home and away. It’s structured, the symmetry is great, there is no reason to take into account non-conference games.
Objective Tiebreaker Solution
The way it should have worked would be to take the three teams in the three-way tie and look at the points margin in the 3 games they played against each other with a 10 or 14 point cap on each game. There are multiple ways to do this:
1. The third team in this points margin comparison is eliminated and then the top two teams are compared based on their head-to-head game.
2. The top team in total points margin advances, if two or three teams are still tied then you take the top points margin in games against common conference foes, if two or three teams are still tied then you take the top points margin team taking into consideration all conference games, if two or three teams are still tied then you go to a draw.
Frankly, I prefer the margin of victory process of elimination followed by the head-to-head comparison better but either way it doesn’t involve voting, it doesn’t encourage scoring late and blowing people out, and it doesn’t involve non-conference games.
And even so, I still think that margin of victory systems favor offensive-minded team. OU is probably the least complete team of the half dozen teams in the mix with a defense ranked 60th and special teams with problems that are well documented. But their stellar offense bails them out of all of this and teams like USC and Penn State that play great defense and special teams get left out of the discussion.
Saturday Night ABC Games
One last rant about Saturday Night ABC games…
Saturday Night nationally televised 7 PM ABC games are the biggest home field advantage in the sport. Of the teams in the 3-way tie everyone played at least one at home and exactly one on the road. Homefield advantage regardless is an advantage throughout the entirety of the game but I think these nationally televised night games bring such a hyped crowd that many teams can get KO’d in the first hour of real human time. One hour, or about a quarter and a half, is my estimate of hour long that initial tidal wave lasts. If you look at the scores of these games at the midway point of the second quarter you will see what I mean:
Missouri at Texas 0-35
Texas at Texas Tech 0-19
Oklahoma St at Texas Tech 7-21
Texas Tech at Oklahoma 0-28
Oklahoma at Oklahoma St 14-13
If I am a coach on the road in one of these games I am making it my goal to burn all three first half timeouts in the first quarter. If they start a drive at their own 20 by the time they reach my 40 I am burning one to try and break up that momentum and chill that crowd out. Any time I’m in a third down situation and the crowd is really bringing it, unless I can see we have the perfect call on, I am burning a timeout. Adding 10-15 minutes of human time worth of commercials without any game time burning off should make that initial tidal wave subdue faster. Regardless they are going to have an advantage but it’s all about withstanding that initial wave.
Big XII Coach of the Year
And last and I’m serious this time how do you give Big XII coach of the year to Mike Leach and Bob Stoops. Preseason OU, Texas Tech, and Texas were unanimously picked to finish 1, 2, 3 by the media and that 3 finished tri-divisions champs with 1 and 2. This is the least talented Texas team in the 11 years Mack Brown has been the coach. Whereas the Rose Bowl teams sent 30 guys to NFL rosters I would be shocked if this team sent more than 6-8. Mike Leach… maybe. Bob Stoops? Give me a freaking break!
-hj
Written by Hujo on December 2nd, 2008 with no comments.
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Assuming Texas Tech, Oklahoma, and Texas beat Baylor, Oklahoma State, and Texas A&M respectively we should be able to determine the Big XII South representative based on the outcome of this Saturday’s Texas Tech at Oklahoma game. If Texas Tech wins at Oklahoma they go. Nobody disputes that. But considering Oklahoma is a touchdown favorite going into this weekend it makes sense to delve into what happens if Oklahoma takes care of Texas Tech. It is my belief that logically it makes the most sense to have Texas represent the Big XII South IF Oklahoma beats Texas Tech Saturday.
Home Field
In this scenario each of the three beat one of the other three and lost to one of the other three. Everyone took care of home. The catch is Texas is the only one of the three that didn’t have a game at home. Their win came by 10 points in a neutral site game which should prove to be more impressive than either home win.
Comparing Losses
Considering the circumstances Texas’ loss was most impressive. The atmosphere was the most raucous in the history of the Texas Tech football program. The losing score came on an incredible play with one second to play. And consider that Texas held Texas Tech, one of the strongest offenses in the country, out of the endzone for nearly 40 consecutive minutes.
Strength of Schedule
A lot of projections have Oklahoma passing Texas based on the strength of their non-conference schedule and the timing (late) of their games against Texas Tech and Oklahoma State. The strength of your non-conference schedule when you schedule mid-majors involves a lot of luck. Texas’ non-conference mid majors included bowl teams from a year ago that just happen to suck this year. Consider that Texas played four straight Top 10 teams, something that had never been done, and were one second from going 4-0. Again, getting to play four consecutive Top 10 teams involves luck as well, as does getting to end your season against two ranked teams, but as long as we are going to factor in luck lets take it all in and if you gave me the choice of Oklahoma’s schedule and Texas’ schedule I would chose Oklahoma’s because its the easier route.
Proven in Big Games
Tech has won 10 Bowl Games in their history and half of them have come in the last 6 years. The program has never been hotter. Texas has won 6 of their last 7 bowl games. Their program is also as hot as it has been since the 1960s. Oklahoma has won 1 Bowl Game in the last 5 years, has gone 1-3 against Texas the last four years, and 2-2 against Texas Tech the last 4 years. Oklahoma is easily the most disappointing program win considering big games in recent history. The fact that Oklahoma has performed so poorly in big games may just prove that all of this breakdown was meaningless if they lay an egg against Texas Tech. Don’t you want to put forth your best big game team in a conference championship game?
Is this not obvious? What am I missing?
Side note: Reason 12,387 we need a playoff so instead of having this debate we could take 8 teams and have 7 great games and settle all of this on the field in a structured way.
-hj
Written by Hujo on November 20th, 2008 with 3 comments.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMk5sMHj58I
I’m starting to really understand Herm Edwards. In this sports world of stats overload (fantasy sports, batting averages with a 3-1 count, slugging percentages, and yards after catch) I think we forget that the most important statistic is how often does a player or a team look to the scoreboard to see a number next to their team that is greater than the number aside the opposition.
The score is the only metric that really matters, other statistics only either loosely translate to what determines the outcome of the game or attempt to determine who had a greater individual contribution. But in the end the verdict of who wins doesn’t depend on statistics that may indirectly affect the score nor does it care about the distribution or magnitude of individual contributions.
A couple of years ago Mack Brown in his preseason press conference talked about a 10 year study his staff did in attempting to find what single statistic most closely correlated to wins and the result was points allowed. Its makes sense because the saying goes defense wins championships.
But why then does the NFL rank defenses by yards allowed? Bill Parcells often would talk of the rule of thumb that every 100 yards of offense, defense, or penalties usually equated to a score. But why use that rule of thumb that doesn’t always hold true anyways?
Last year an NFL writer for the Dallas Morning News was making a point about how distinguished the top 5 defenses were (using the NFL yards allowed). I emailed him and asked who cares about those 5 teams? What really mattered was the top 5 points allowed defenses which was a completely different subset of teams. History shows they will win more games so who really cares about the yards allowed?
Another common stastical comparison that I don’t understand is TD passes versus INTs for QBs. That is comparing a statistic that directly affects the outcome of the game to a statistic that indirectly sometimes affects the outcome of the game (the score). If a QB throws 15 TDs and 30 INTs chances are he still produced more points than his team surrendered.
Basketball and Hockey are the only sports that track the scoring differential when individuals are on the court or rink but those are very telling statistics in my opinion.
This brings me to a different point. Quarterbacks are largely mis evaluated in general. Quarterbacks are often evaluated by TD passes, passing yards, completion percentages, interceptions, and passer ratings. The position is unlike any in sports. Everybody naturally looks to a quarterback for leadership and morale. I have been on a team where the QB got hurt and a younger, not very confident guy took over who didn’t have “it.” That substitution didn’t just affect the output at the QB position or the play of the offense. It affected the play of the entire team in all 3 phases of the game.
I’m willing to say that the actual on the field play of a QB is only half of what he can contribute to a team. The moxie and confidence the rest of the team sees in the way he leads even when he plays poorly positively affects the rest of the team.
Peyton Manning was statistically the best quarterback for years but Tom Brady who put up very modest statistics was the one winning the big games and championships.
Texas Tech quarterbacks lead the country in passing every year but how many of them have ever led a team to a lot of wins or a championship or took a snap in the NFL?
I really started to buy into this concept in college watching Vince Young. His sophomore year he really came into his own, put up great statistics, and led a good team.
The next year after the previous class of leaders left and the team became his team into which he could insert his DNA, that same team minus the departed seniors and leaders became a Great team.
That swagger, that confidence, that holding yourself accountable was contagious to every person on the team. The same defense and special teams that was okay the year before became great.
Wins are what matters and quarterbacks should be measured accordingly. Their on the field performance is only 50% of what they contribute. If you give me the option of an average QB who has “it” and a great passer who doesn’t I’m taking the guy who makes every person in the locker room better.
I recently was telling some friends that if I were the Ravens I would go with Troy Smith. Yea he’s too small. Yea maybe he’s not the greatest passer in the world but he is a winner. He has shown he can lead.
Now let’s look at Tim Tebow. Tebow inherited a national championship team and went 9-4 while throwing 29 TDs. Going 9-4 is a bad season at a top ten powerhouse type program. If he did that at Texas it would be the worst season in 8 years. Hell if I were the QB there I’d expect to go 9-4. His 29 TDs is a good year for a passer but not anywhere near record breaking. Where he was very impressive was in rushing TDs. So these writers gave a Heisman trophy to a QB who lead (50% of a QBs contribution) to a bad season but was liberally utilized by his team as their goal line running back?
At the end of the day we have a quarterback, VY, who led an undefeated team, the highest scoring offense of all-time, and the team that posted the greatest margin of victory, who DOESN’T have a Heisman but Tim Tebow does?
Now Titan fans aren’t happy with his on the field performance. Last year his on the field performance was sub par but then again his number 1 WR was a guy named Roydell Williams (Haven’t heard of him? Neither had I). Leadership is the other half of the puzzle for QBs and based on his past and the fact that he wears a C on his jersey I assume that’s how he is viewed now.
He lead that no name Titans team in the toughest conference and the toughest division in football to a 10-6 record and a playoff birth. Matt Leinart and Alex Smith were Heisman trophy winners and #1 draft picks but neither of them even START for the Cardinals or 49ers, both of whom are horrible, and they don’t have near the haters that VY does.
In Sports, in football, and especially in the NFL they say winning is all that matters. Have some people forgot and replaced that with individual statistical performance?
-hj
Written by Hujo on September 11th, 2008 with no comments.
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About a year ago I was made aware of an interesting exercise in the form of a birthday card that apparently is known to everyone except me. The card read “How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you were.” I think it’s an interesting concept. We as society are constantly attempting to compartmentalize and quantify things and then map those results to a prescribed list of characteristics. The message is if the number says 50 but you still feel youthful, say more like 30, then forget the number 50 prescribed list and live the 30.
I would like to extend that concept to our perception of politics and the economy. What would we think about this administration if we weren’t told what to think. Have events in your life been dramatically altered? If we weren’t told the economy was in bad shape would that still be the opinion just based on what we see around us? In the interest of full disclosure I live somewhat of an unusual lifestyle. I do not hardly personally directly consume with my own dollars any of the handful of things that seem out of whack: gas prices, food prices, the mortgage situation, the devalued dollar, etc. In fact the one time recently I did spend money in a foreign currency it was the Mexican Peso which the US dollar has actually strengthened against.
The point is there are some areas where the economy seems out of whack but that list is finite and doesn’t effect us the way a recession would. For a while now people have been talking scared about the economy. Guess what the economy, measured by GDP, actually grew in both the first and second quarter of 2008. Think back to 2002. I’m sure everyone knew one or more people who got laid off. I have not heard of a single friend, family friend, acquantance, whatever who has been laid off recently. In fact most of the people I know have gotten raises.
If prices of certain things we consume raise but wages raise too then that’s called inflation. Hopefully for the sake of your future your investments grow at that same rate or better but nevertheless your current situation and buying power should be unchanged.
I got in a debate recently with some friends in Texas about how bad this economy really is. In a poll of Corporate Executives Texas was ranked the number one state to do business for the fourth year in a row receiving over 40% of the vote. A state that represents about 10% of the population accounts for over 50% of new jobs created. You don’t pay state income tax and most likely don’t pay dues to a union that is choking to death your employer. So of all people to not be able to see through this smoke screen…
People freak out when Phil Gramm says that a recession is just a figment of people’s imagination. Now I am suprised he wasn’t able to predict that people would be too naïve and cynical of an old rich white guy in a suit to understand his point but I know exactly what he was saying. The statistics that show the economy is in a bad spot ARE mental. Consumer confidence is down but guess what? The unemotional/rational GDP measure is still growing.
How about instead of hoping and thinking that the economy is going to sink, you buy stuff and invest in the stock market?
If you think you can or can’t you’re right.
-hj
Written by Hujo on August 17th, 2008 with 1 comment.
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An important lesson I’ve picked up is to consider the source. Everybody says take everything thing with a grain of salt but that just means be cynical all the time. Consider the source means ask yourself who said this, what are their motives, and how does that effect what they would say.
Case 1
Everybody is freaking out about oil prices. The price of a barrell doubles in a years time. Everybody is rushing to explain why. Oil speculators, weak dollar, china and india’s growing economies, you name it. Everybody has an answer. So I am reading some Yahoo Finance article about the situation and they basically build the entire article around a quote from the CEO of BP. The BP CEO claims oil prices are based in unexpected demand and limited supply and oil speculators have little to do with it. So here is a guy that reports to a board who attempts to hold him accountable for the company’ stock price. Here is a guy whose compensation is probably highly dependent on the performance of that stock and a story takes his claim that the price of oil is not highly overvalued as fact and runs with it.
Case 2
While reading a Business Week article about US Manufacturing jobs the debate is whether high transportation prices, logistical supply chain type considerations, and the US Dollar will result in manufacturing jobs coming back to the US. There is somewhat of a conclusion made that manufacturing sites are not inherently super agile and that these jobs will stay in China, which I agree with. But to support this conclusion they quote Xu Dongsheng who heads up the China Household Electrical Appliances Assn. Well geez that’s as close to asking a third party analyst whose hand is not in the pot as you can get.
Case 3
I have discussed this subject at nausea on this blog but Mark Cuban uses his blogmaverick.com to communicate directly to people so he’s words are not spun. Last fall he comes out with a post totally unprompted and after essentially swearing off discussing basketball following The Great Heat-Mavs Scandal of 2006 (remind me to come up with a better name). He goes into this detailed breakdown about how Devin Harris is the best defensive point guard in the game because of his quickness. The whole time he is making points and rattling off stats and you’re thinking to yourself “Yeah, Yeah you”re right”. What I didn’t do was consider the source. Mark Cuban is a smart business man. If he intended to continually resign Devin Harris and keep him as a Mav for life wouldn’t it cost him a ton of money to publicly admit this. On the other hand, if he had insider information about Harris’ ability and potential and wanted to trade him wouldn’t it behoove him to have Harris’ value as high as possible so that he could be packaged in a deal for say… Jason Kidd?
-hj
Written by Hujo on August 8th, 2008 with 1 comment.
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Too often coaches get into these big games and do just that… flinch. They get away from what got them there. Legendary Texas coach Darrell K Royal has a saying “Dance with the one who brung ya.” That’s exactly what I’m talking about. If something is working don’t out coach yourself.
Last year the Mavs go off with the third best season in NBA history and in Game 1 against the Golden State Warriors they go small with their starting lineup, something they hadn’t done all season. Avery Johnson flinched. If you are the one seed playing the eight, just keep doing whatever you’ve been doing to that point and 99% of the time you’ll come out the other end.
Bill Belicheck and the New England Patriots flinched in the Super Bowl. The Patriots had gone 18-0 with Tom Brady chunking it up to Randy Moss to form the most prolific offense in NFL history. Until the last desperation drive they ran a completely different offense. And I don’t want to hear the excuse that they couldn’t do what they wanted to do because of the New York Giants. A month earlier they played the New York Giants IN New York and did just that… chunked the ball up to Randy Moss and lit up the scoreboard.
Texas lost last year’s national player of the year yet this year’s team was a popular final four pick whereas last year’s team didn’t even make it out of the first weekend. Every time a player or Rick Barnes was asked how that could be they pointed to the defensive side of the court. The offensive ppg were nearly identical but the ppg allowed was drastically improved. All season, the best record-wise in school history I should add, they did this by employing a 2-3 zone that prevented our undersized and depth lacking backcourt from getting singled out and worn out. For the majority of the tournament we went with this defense and won. In yesterday’s game with Memphis, in the first 6 minutes not only did Barnes flinch he put us in a situation where more mismatches were created. Our guards were 4 and 6 inches shorter than the guys they were told to man up. I think that 4 of the 5 one on one matches created mismatches in Memphis’ favor. If you are playing a tall, long team that plays above the rim why do you go man especially if that’s not what YOU do. After coming out of the under 12 timeout we finally went back to the 2-3 zone for the rest of the half and Memphis scored only 5 points in the half court. Then in the second half we come out with some kind of middle school box and one defense that I haven’t EVER seen us play. Rick Barnes, you flinched.
-hj
Written by Hujo on March 31st, 2008 with 1 comment.
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This is why they play the game. Upsets. Sports are unpredictable and that’s what makes them great. If games played out exactly how they stacked up on paper there would be no sense in watching.
I had a friend in college who was simply not a sports fan. He didn’t go to the football games and rarely even watched them on TV. His argument: I already know what’s going to happen, whats the point.
There are two types of really exciting games. The one where two teams are very evenly matched and going in you don’t know what is going to happen and there is a dramatic finish. The other is when you do think you know what is going to happen and the opposite happens.
The point of going to a game or watching it on tv isn’t so that you can be the first to know the result of the game. It’s so that you can experience the suspense and drama as it happens.
In my new years resolution/goal setting post I talked about eliminating the watching of bogus games. But now I’m thinking… if I had applied that rule would I have been watching the Michigan-Appalachian State game last fall?
Only watching the games that appear to be good on paper requires only watching a limited number of games.
Watching any game that ends up being a good game whether or not it originally appeared to or not requires you watch a ton if not all of the games. Not that it will kill you to miss one but if you had the choice you’d rather not.
And to the point of the dramatic upset, what has been going on lately? It seems we are in the golden era of the sports upset.
Greatest first round upset in NBA history, Appalachian state over Michigan AT Michigan, Stanford over USC as 41 pt dogs, 18-0 Pats/team 2 and a half minutes away from being unanimously pronounced greatest team ever upset by a 6 loss wildcard who didn’t win their division.
I think pulling for the underdog in sports is something inherently American.
Now there are exceptions. In my travels over the past year I have met people from Omaha and Connecticut who claim to love the Cowboys, neither of whom have stepped foot in the state of Texas.
I think everyone has an example similar to this involving a Yankee fan.
I heard a quote about 6 months ago claiming that “Rooting for the Yankees is like going to a casino and rooting for the house.” Why if you were not a native New Yorker would you root for the Yankees?
A coworker on my most recent project moved to New Jersey over 10 years ago from Australia. I asked if he was a Yankee fan and I thought he said yea but I wasn’t sure. He then said, “You have to understand when I moved in ‘95 the Mets were horrible.” Oh, so you are a Mets fan?
Long story short I thought he had jumped on with the Mets during a rough time and rode the rollercoaster to their current status of annual challenger. He thought it made perfect sense to find out the favorite and root for them. How is that the noble thing to do?
Before yesterday’s Super Bowl a buddy and I tried to convince ourselves it would be better if the Patriots won because both of us knew and worked with New Yorkers and knew it would be unbearable to be around them if they won, especially coming off the hands of them defeating the Cowboys.
But once the game started I couldn’t help myself. Any 50/50 play I found myself instinctively pulling for the underdog. And that why we play the game.
Hj
Written by Hujo on February 4th, 2008 with 2 comments.
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