High-major wisdom

Mid-Majority man Kyle Whelliston on Vince Lombardi’s winning-is-everything pap:

Seriously? Are there people out there who believe this garbage to be true, relevant or inspirational? The part that’s missing here is that time doesn’t stop, and there’s no happily-ever-after or The End with a great victory. Nowadays, as Lombardi’s battle-man lies expended, agents will pick his pocket, and sportswriters will demand endless repeats of the performance for the sake of “validity.” Then, some guy’s liable to come long, pull down the hero’s pants, and take a picture of his schwanz for Deadspin.

Number 1 has to come back and defend the title, over and over. Unless this great and noble warrior keeps winning, stays in first place forever, maintains a pure and perfect Johnny Champion image, the story arc always points to the same place: loser. With all due respect to Vince Lombardi, losing is not a habit, it’s the default state of the universe. There is as much room for second place as there is for first, and a whole lot more room below that. To defeat enemies, expectations and the passage of time in equal measure is impossible, and nobody goes undefeated.

Vince Lombardi died of colon cancer several years after giving that speech.

I’m not a great coach, and as famous former colleagues have rightly pointed out, I never played the game. But I do know about losing. I see it every day after every contest, and I get to see the emotions it brings out: flashes of anger, somber regret, numb acceptance. No team that I’ve ever covered won at the end in March, and it always ends in a loss. The true alternate subtitle of this website is A Chronicle Of Loss Management.