So one of the jobs and duties that I have on the side is keeping statistics for the Houston MLS team, the Dynamos. Really great organization. I get all the peanuts and diet cokes that I want every game. I get free parking and admission to the press box so that I can keep stats during the game. The key job of a stats person is to record items that the TV/print/web journalists are interested in. Last week for the New England game we had to count the number of times that two players touched the ball. Someone had a theory that the balance of the game changed with the number of touches of they key midfielders. Amazingly, it was true. There were minutes where nothing happened and the game got a little boring. The key players were walking, loping, or even jogging to get to the play. The defenders were hanging tight with them then started to drop back a little to try and intercept a pass or breakup a pass. That was their key mistake. Every time that happened, the player who was apparently sleeping woke up and created a play, shot on goal, or assisted someone else in a great scoring opportunity.
Last night I got to go to a double header, the Dynamos vs LA Galaxy followed by FC Barcelona vs Club America. The Galaxy and Dynamos have a grudge match going and the star midfielder for the Dynamos was out of the game with a red card. A typical game sees these two battling and fighting for possession and control of the offense. Typically fifteen to twenty thousand people show up for a game. A nice crowd that gets into the game. Last night there were seventy thousand that showed up for the game. The key reasons? The European champion was playing the American champion. Two of the best teams in the world were playing each other and every soccer fan wanted to see them play.
The key elements that I saw in the games last night were control, movement, and seizing an opportunity. The speed of play for the MLS team was a little measured and controlled. Plays developed but they developed slowly. When a fast break happened it was two or three players. With Club American and Barcelona, a fast break was four or five players and usually didn’t happen. It was more of a surgical strike to get a pass in or flip a high ball ten yards to someone who is making a break. It was truly exciting to watch the game and the crowd reacting to the players.
Moments like this make me wax philosophical. How can I take my work or exercise or playing with the kids up a notch? Do I need to read one more book that makes me that much smarter? Do I need to put in ten more minutes on the eliptical training? Do I need to make sure that I play a game for fifteen more minutes to get more fun in before bedtime? No. Getting better at something that you do isn’t the true answer. Getting better at something you do with others is the answer. It is one thing to know all the details of a product, it is another thing to know the technical details and have someone else know the business justifications and have someone else know how other people have succeeded or failed in production roll outs. It is one thing to spend time working on leg strength, it is another thing to work on cardio or upper arm strength. It is one thing to spend time with your kids, it is another thing to find out what they want to do and do it with them. For example, I really don’t like playing tennis. It ruins my racketball game. My youngest son loves the game and wants to get into it. I realized that I haven’t played racketball in almost two years. I need to stop worrying about a game that I really don’t have the opportunity to play and play the game that my son wants to play.
Isn’t it amazing how a little think like watching a soccer double header can put your life into perspective and make you think about what is important and how to make it better?