Growing up I played baseball. Here’s a game with oceanic gaps between plays and that celebrates its participants for 70% fail rates. That’s to say, there are ample opportunities for one to play poorly and think a whole lot about it so it came as no surprise when we were repeatedly told by coaches – the same ones who would berate us for these errors – that “In this sport, it’s best to have a short memory.” We were encouraged to forget the last play and move on to the next. There would be no use in spending an inning and a half dwelling on the missed breaking ball if it was just going to cause me to miss the next one. Perhaps that’s the genius of Manny Ramirez: a definitive lack of genius.
While baseball was the forum in which I learned this lesson, it’s clear this is a universal skill, applicable across the world of sport and far beyond. From career to dating to the day-to-day grind of being a semi-functioning member of society, there are peaks and valleys, highs and lows. Each is to be taken in stride for what it is with lessons learned and growth made. And then? On to the next. As this Pac-12 Basketball season gets under way - a weekend already stuffed with both highs and lows - we’ll soon get to see the application of this moving-on mechanism.
And the first team that comes to mind is Colorado. That was a tough weekend with the most immediate of ups and downs obviously coming over a monitor in Tucson. We are not going to linger on that. What was impressive was the opening half of the opening halves in Tucson and Tempe. The Buffs held both Arizona and Arizona State to just seven points for the first eleven minutes of each game. That’s a team that can D up. Then the game, certainly in Tempe, got away from Colorado, though I do think ASU played a tremendous defensive game. The Buffs may have been exposed for their youth and depth issues but to mention this is to shy away from the aforementioned process. This is two games of an 18-gamer, 11% of the way home and wearing a pair of L’s, while not good, is not back breaking. This is the quintessential time to focus in the realm of “how to” as opposed to “what if.”
As for examples, I’ll say that it appears Ben Howland is pretty good at not getting too high or too low over anything but the temperature of the film room. He seemingly comes under heat and praise by the half game and his current seven-game win streak is note worthy. Or is it? Whatever there is to make of it, Shabazz Muhammad is playing scary good and while the Bruins still look identity-less at times, there will be no point in the season when someone wants to play them.
Conversely, Johnny Dawkins’ team is in the midst of not playing particularly well at all. Swept in SoCal and playing at a generally underwhelming level, the Cardinal strike me as a very momentum dependent team. They’ll get hot and roll with that which completely bucks the idea of the short memory principle but if its what they need to win, then so be it. Their task will be ensuring that the momentum they build is not in the wrong column. Oregon State stumbled heading in to conference play (Towson?) and will soon find that losing at home is a general non-option in conference play. Particularly in games you held a six-point half time lead in.
But here I am, guilty once again of not adhering the sage lessons of my baseball coaches past, painting these teams with the broad brushstrokes of condemnation with but one weekend worth of paint on my palette. Unfair. Is it Wednesday yet?
