I'm disappointed with many of you today. Everywhere I went last weekend and yesterday during my day off I heard people talking about how they were rooting for the Cardinals in the Super Bowl because "the Steelers have won a bunch of times--and I want someone different to win for a change."
That leads me to ask: What's wrong with sustained excellence? Why don't we celebrate those who continue to do their jobs better than everyone else on a consistant basis?
Just because they have now won six Super Bowls doesn't make the Steelers a team to be hated. I can guarantee you, executives in 29 other NFL franchises are wishing they had the same success and would love to follow the same formula. They have had just three head coaches in 40-years--and all three have won championships. I'd be willing to bet that even hard-core Packers fans would be hard pressed to name all nine of the coaches that team has had in the same time frame. All of the stars making the big plays that gave the Steelers the win on Sunday were drafted by the franchise--they weren't high priced free agents the Steelers picked up to make a one-time run to the title. And since the Cardinals have had far less success in recent decades, they could have drafted any of those same players.
Just imagine if the NFL decided that "to be fair and give everybody a chance" only teams that haven't won before are allowed to play in the Super Bowl? "Tune in for Super Bowl 44--featuring the Detroit Lions and the Cincinnati Bengals!!!!" Or if the NFL was run like most youth sports today--which treats winning and losing like some kind of evil and doesn't even keep score--the post-game ceremony would have taken forever as every team owner was presented with a Lombardi Trophy and every player in the league was given a Super Bowl ring.
This same attitude extends to life outside of sports. Rich, successful people are "greedy" and need to share more with those who aren't so successful. The guy who puts in 50 or 60 hours of work to make the company better is a "suck up" and is just making everyone else look "lazy".
So keep hating on winners bandwagon Cardinals fans. What are you going to do next year when the Dallas Cowboys are going for their sixth Super Bowl title against the Miami Dolphins--who have won twice? Success--that's a tradition we should believe in.
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Jonathan. I don't think people were routing against success as much as they were routing FOR someone to succeed where they have not succeeded before. What's wrong with that?
ReplyDeleteYou are right on with your comments. I'm guessing that the people saying this were packers fans. If it were the packers, would they be saying the same thing? As a side question for you, Jonathan, I'd like to hear your take on why anyone would hire Matt Millen to do analysis. Didn't he take a bad team and make them the worst ever?
ReplyDeleteMore piggish union greed news hits the papers today.
ReplyDeleteBen Franklin would be turning over in his grave if he could see what the institution he invented looks like today.
The Post Office has lost $7.9 BILLION dollars in the past two years. In an attempt to stop the downward spiral, the Post Office is considering cutting back mail deliver from 6 days a week to 5 days a week.
The biggest reason for the drop loss, and the biggest challenge to overcome is the cost of providing healthcare to current and future retirees. The postal service owes its retiree heath fund $7.4 billion this year alone.
With 650,000 workers, the Postal Service is the United States third largest employer, after Wal-Mart and the Defense Department.
Union contracts make layoffs rare…Raises are automatic…sounds similar to our teachers and city public sector workers.
Greedy CEO’s and Greedy Unions are ruining this Country!