Another day, another... well certainly not dollar

So today was the last day of work for my wife. She is officially unemployed. A few months ago, the company she worked for filed bankruptcy, and we were left wondering what was going to happen. They put the company up for auction and basically two different companies began bidding. One, a smaller company in the same field but would benefit from the structure her company had to offer and the significant client base they would have gained. If this company won, they might have even offered her a job.

The second company is the largest company in this field in the world. Pretty much, everyone knew they were bidding in order to quash their competition.

Guess who won.

My wife was the marketing and promotions manager so she was personally responsible for all of their online advertising, navigation banners, artwork, etc. Within three hours of the closing, the website was shutdown. In three hours they "blow'd up" all of her work for the past year. Luckily we will be moving in 5 or 6 months anyway so she would have been looking for a job then. Plus she gets unemployment benefits whereas she wouldn't have if she had simply quit.

So, she will be home a lot for the next few months, which is nice.

Mercy

I read an article today about a coach getting fired for winning 100-0 in a girls varsity basketball game. I have to say that, after reading the article, I agree with the decision. At first, I didn't know what I thought, but the coach's response is what turned me against him. He was completely unapologetic and didn't see anything wrong with running the score up so high.

This story is a little personal to me. I coached basketball. I even coached girl's basketball. One year, I was the coach of a 7th & 8th grade girls team. The year before we had all 8th graders who were all fairly experienced, so we did pretty well. The following year, those girls all moved up to the freshman team, and my team consisted of all 7th graders, most of whom had never really picked up a basketball. We had three weeks (twice a week) of practice before our first game, and I was teach them how to dribble the ball and shoot. The team we were to play first was one of the better teams in the league, made up of mostly 8th graders, their practices were consisting of strategy, defense, different offensive sets, and the like.

The day of the game was rough. By halftime, their coach realized that we were severely outmatched. The score was 53-0. He had already, by the middle of the second quarter, shifted his team into a 2-3 zone so that there wouldn't be as many steals, but my girls didn't know yet how to change directions while dribbling and they basically dribbled the ball right into the opposing team's hands. In the third quarter, the other coach told his girls to just stand there with their hands up. Still, we would lose the ball and they would take it down for a lay up. The final score was 86-1. Our one point came from a free throw that banked in so hard I thought the girl had thrown the ball baseball style at the backboard.

I did not (and do not) fault the other coach. He tried to lessen the margin of loss by putting in his substitutes, changing his strategy, and even putting restrictions on his players' scoring. But, if a middle school girl has a wide open shot to score, so that her parents can see, I would never begrudge her that. Our girls were a little upset, but I tried to encourage them by pointing out the fact that they had all just begun to play while the other team had been playing together for a while. I promised them that if they worked hard in practice, we would improve.

We never won a game that season. However, our last 5 games of the year went down to the wire. The girls' skills improved to the point where we could implement different offensive and defensive sets. They could finally put the ball in the basket. We had one game that went into double overtime against a team that had previously beat us by 20 points.

Oh, and the team we played first and lost to by 85, we played 2nd to last and lost by 3. Despite the losses, the improvement throughout that year was astounding and it was one of my favorite years coaching.

I thank that coach for having mercy on us in that first game. The score could have been much worse. But I also thank him for the harsh wake up call to the girls on my team that they had a long way to go. It lit a fire under them to really work hard in practice (and out of practice). Some of them went on to be very good players at the high school level. Sometimes we need to get our asses kicked, but the other side doesn't need to be a jerk about it (as it seems this particular coach from the article was).

Cliché?

I know everyone will be posting this today, but it should never become so commonplace that we forget the impact this man actually had.

Decisions

I read a great quote today about how to go about making decisions about the future.

"I always recommend to people that they follow
the Ignatian principle. Regardless of what is sensible,
and regardless of what you think you 'ought' to do,
which of the courses ahead of you makes you feel alive,
makes your heart open wider, makes you feel hopeful
and as if the future is opening up not closing down?
That is the route you should go."

It is this thinking that allowed the Jesuits, despite great opposition even from within their own church, to spread throughout the world.

Now, don't get me wrong. Some of the methods of some Jesuits were appalling. The way some Jesuit missionaries viewed Native Americans was racist and not in line with the values to which I believe God calls us. That being said, they were willing to go where others were unwilling. Many were martyred. The film "The Mission" is a fantastic story about Jesuit missionaries (by the way, I agree with Jeremy Irons' character rather than Robert DeNiro, but I understand DeNiro's thinking).

As Kristy and I think about the future, we are scared, excited, apprehensive, and gun-ho (BTW, this is correct... it is not "gung-ho") all at the same time. Now it is time to practice some of the other principles put forth by Ignatius of Loyola. We must, listen and look for the leading from God. But the fact that our next steps stir so much emotion is a sign that we might be headed in the right direction.

Coming Soon

I will have a new post up on Saturday and should be able to be more consistent once this semester is over. Saturday's post will be about advent, peace, war, and the promises and prophecies about the messiah.

No "I" in "Team"

I just came across a fantastic example of putting the team before yourself. A few weeks ago, a friend of mine posted a blog entry about leadership and how an integral quality of a leader is putting her/his own desires and ambitions second to the needs of the team as a whole. In a sense, it is having the attitude that they would rather win as a team and fail (or not look good) as an individual than have individual success yet see their team fail.

Last night (11-25-08) Loyola (Md.) was crushed in basketball by Davidson. Now, this was actually the anticipated result considering Davidson has the top scorer in the country (averaging 35 ppg. and has only ever not reached double figures twice in his career) and has a significant size advantage over Loyola. According to the article, the story isn't the win but how it happened.

A common defense utilized by teams when playing a team with a player that is heads and tails above the rest is a box-and-one where four players are in a zone defense and the "one" is playing a denial man defense against the star player. Loyola took this concept even further and decided to double-team Curry. Now, typically a double-team would consist of one person permanently guarding Curry and the other defenders covering him as well when he enters into their specific zone. It takes a lot of work for the defenders but it is designed to leave the farthest area of court unguarded... the area least likely to have a scoring opportunity at that particular moment. But Loyola's coach simply put two men on Curry and told them to stay with him. Early in the game, Curry was frustrated since he had trouble getting the ball through two defenders, but quickly he realized that this wasn't a match-up zone or a box-and-one but that he was simply being double-teamed.

So, what did the top college player in the nation, most likely the number one draft choice, do? He stood in the corner... literally. He would play hard defense and then, when he team would take possession, he would jog down the court and camp out in the corner, taking his two defenders with him and leaving a 4 on 3 advantage for his other teammates.

For the first time in his career, Curry was held scoreless for an entire game. His team won by 30 points. That is selfless. That is teamwork. That is leadership.

Finishing Strong

Two more weeks of classes this semester! This has been the hardest one I've had since going back to school. Six classes, only two of which I was truly interested in (although one of them has become very interesting), plus the part-time jobs, plus finding time to spend with Kristy, plus getting stuff together to apply to seminary has really been tough. But, it has been good. It has shown me that I can work extremely hard at something, succeed, and go all the way to the end with it. This is a marathon, not a sprint. The little victories along the way help to keep the motivation high, but the race does not end with the little victories, it end with the tape being broken.

Whether or not I am the one who breaks the tape is irrelevant (although it always increases the desire to think about winning), the fact that I will finish is what matters. As long as I can honestly say I didn't hold anything back and I virtually collapse on the other side of the finish line, I will be more than satisfied.

I was on the Track and Field team all four years in high school. I was more there for the field events (specifically high jump... personal best was 6'3" in case you were wondering), but because Madeira (Home of the Mustangs!) was a small school we had to pitch in where we were needed. My senior year I was tapped to be a part of the 3200 meter relay. This is where four people run two laps (800 meters) each, passing a baton after each leg. An 800 is one of the hardest races in track since it is right at the break between a distance race and a sprint. Basically, you are sprinting a long distance... it sucks. But, I have always been sort of competitive so I tried to take it seriously. I was given the third leg to run.

The first meet was a tri-meet where one of the schools was our rival. Turns out, I knew the guy running the third leg for them. We competed against each other in football, basketball, and even (**NERD ALERT**) Latin competitions ("Certamen" if you will). So, I wanted to beat him. Unfortunately, when I was handed the baton, we were in last place by at least a quarter lap. So, I took off. I ran as hard as I could. At the halfway point I had caught the other two runners. By the end of my leg, I had gotten us a quarter of a lap lead. My time was 2:04. I threw up on the infield as soon as I stepped off the track.

Sadly, our anchor was not as "into it" as I was. He showed up wearing high tops for crying out loud! He lost the lead I had gotten and we lost the race. I was pissed, but I also knew I had left everything on that track... and so did my coach.

That is how I want to finish school. That is how I want to finish life. That is when the Father will say, "Well done good and faithful servant."

Finish Strong.