Win-Wins and Double Losses

I generally watch about 8 quarters of football and 10 halves of basketball each year.  (I played both in high school and enjoy the sports as well as their life lessons.) Last night I watched the first few minutes of the Orange Bowl with Clemson against West Virginia.  Clemson was moving the ball without much resistance.  When Andre Ellington scored the game's first points on a 68-yard run, I figured it was pretty much over and went to bed. 

Incidentally, during this early course of events, one of Clemson’s tight ends dropped a critical pass that was – by almost any account – “catchable”.  Coach Swinney exploded!  He yelled at the player all the way off the field to the bench, and then for a good long while as he sat on the bench.  He knew it was catchable; the fans knew it was catchable; and there’s little doubt that the tight end knew it was catchable.  Not a life-and-death matter, you might say – particularly as everything else seemed to be clicking.  BUT IT WAS CATCHABLE!  And what Coach Swinney knew that the players may not have completely appreciated was the fact that there was no margin for error in this, their last game of the season – a championship game against a formidable opponent. 

Our sanctionable fall-back position in such circumstances is: “It’s not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game.”  I don’t know who said it, but it’s a nice conciliatory thought for also-rans, implying a moral victory for the losing team.  Unfortunately, this particular dropped catch wasn’t Orange Bowl “game-day” play.  But, worse, it wasn’t a level of play of which the tight end was apparently capable.  For rabid football fans – and coaches, that’s bordering on immoral! 

It was a sobering morning line:  West Virginia ended up blowing Clemson out of the water by a score of 70-33.  [“Adjustments” coming in the near future]

This same week, Coach Calipari’s #3 ranked University of Kentucky Wildcats squeaked out a victory over short-manned Arkansas-Little Rock (missing their best player and possessing a Ratings Percentage Index of only #225).  Calipari was distraught beyond consolation.  You don’t play DOWN to your opponent’s level of play; you do your BEST and keep getting BETTER!  [“Adjustments” will be coming in the near future – OR ELSE!]

BOTTOM LINE:  The “ … how you play the game” paradigm IS categorically valid when players and teams give their all-out best effort.  Then, but ONLY then, it really doesn’t matter what the outcome is.  For those insistent on keeping tabs, there’s actually a double ledger here: When you play your best and win the game, that’s a WIN-WIN.  When you play your best and lose the game, that’s a WIN-LOSS.  When you win a game and don’t play your best, that’s a WIN-LOSS.  And when you don’t play your best and lose the game, it’s a DOUBLE LOSS. 

As for me and my team, let’s take the Double Losses off the table.  WIN-WINS remain the all-time industry standard for the duration.  But let’s give our VERY BEST effort and keep getting better no matter what the circumstances, and the WINS will keep coming.  Quartermaster