To Be Or Not To Be......

I have mixed feelings about facing tomorrow. My youngest son is winding down his college football career playing his final game of his senior season. New challenges await, and the unknown looms in the background.

Anytime there is a level change in sports, say from high school to college, or from college to the professional stage, an adjustment must be made by the player. As a senior in high school you step from top dog starter on the field to lowly freshman recruit, surrounded by a hundred just as talented and just as recruited as you. Nothing is taken for granted and you have to reprove yourself to your coaches and colleagues. It's a slice of humble pie that many players and parents have trouble accepting. Especially from high school to college. You left an environment that collected whatever talent was available and created a team, to one that recruited the best talent in the nation. The competition for a starting position is a bar that is much higher than in high school! Only the top 5% go on to play at the college level, and only the top 1% of those get an opportunity to play as a pro. The cream truly does rise to the top.

It's funny to watch incoming freshman and their parents as they make the adjustment. The consumption of humble pie is rampant as they learn that the fruit of their loins is being "red-shirted." That all-star of high school fame was just told he's not up to speed to join on the field yet, but after a year of weight training and the teaching of the system, he'll be the kind of player this team needs. You then see what kind of mettle that athlete has. Is he a quitter, or does he have the stick-to-it-ness required to be one of the ten or twelve that survive four or five years of college football, when a hundred began the quest? It's an adjustment process that defines the man. One of the first statements he makes about how his life will be defined. You can liken it to the struggle a hatch-ling has fighting to emerge from it's egg shell. One it has to go through to be strong enough to survive and one day fly. Any assistance from an onlooker, even with the best intentions, sentences the bird to death, as the struggle is a necessary part of life itself. It's a great process to be a part of, and even more entertaining to observe.

A new adjustment period begins for us as of Sunday. The best of the best will now compete to be good enough to be paid to play the sport they love. And you have to love, eat, sleep, and be absorbed by the game to be successful at the next level. After all, your joining the elite, the top one percent of any profession is a hard nut to crack. As of Saturday evening my hatch-ling is going to get his chance at his wings. It's going to be hard once again to watch the struggle as he breaks out of the shell that now confines him, into a whole new world of opportunity. Whatever the outcome, I couldn't be a prouder Dad.

God Bless!
Capt. Bill