When the Dallas Cowboys were getting beat week after week early in the 2011 season they got a lot of criticism. They were hugely talented and expectations were for them to be legitimate Super Bowl contenders. Super Bowl contenders are supposed to win. When they kept getting beat the criticism came in loud and clear from all corners. To the rescue came local basketball hero Dirk Nowitzki fresh off the Dallas Mavericks recent NBA championship.
Dirk gave encouragement—and really bad advice
Dirk told quarterback Tony Romo and the others that they shouldn’t worry. He reminded them the Mavericks, formed in 1980, had gone without ever winning an NBA Championship until this year and Dirk himself had been with the team since 1998. But, Dirk continued, “if you just keep on working to improve eventually your day will come and you’ll win a Super Bowl.”
Wrong, wrong, wrong! The Cowboys bought this lie—hook, line and sinker. The pressure was off—they could relax. The sting of defeat was not nearly as bad because they now happily believed that eventually they would win. It was inevitable…Dirk said so!
No one is ever guaranteed a championship
Unfortunately, championships are never inevitable. You have to go win them. You have to beat someone who wants it just as bad as you. You have to fight. You have to give it everything you have. If the Cowboys were aware of the perhaps they wouldn’t have finished this season with such a spineless underachieving performance and let themselves get knocked out of the playoffs by the mediocre New York Giants.
This team needs a reality check – bad. They need to be jolted with the truth that no one is ever guaranteed success. Just because you’re talented and think you work hard doesn’t entitle you to anything. The world owes you nothing. Don’t ever think they are going to mail you a trophy just because you worked up a sweat. Sweat and hard work is what everyone does.
All hard work does is give you is a CHANCE to win
In the real world you can work hard for years and years, pay an incredible price, make incredible sacrifices and still never win the “big one.” When you work hard, you take things seriously. You sacrifice and pay the extra prices. But that’s just practice and preparation. All you’re doing is putting yourself in a position to win your championship. Sooner or later the time will come where you actually have to go play the game, compete and win it. The Dallas Cowboys don’t act like they understand this part of winning and as a result, for almost 20 years, they have underachieved at the end of the season, piling up one disappointment after another for their fans to endure.
