The publisher of my new book will be cranking up their marketing plan this week with a press release and a social media plan.

Early on Observations at the Speed of Life broke into the

top one million books sold on Amazon, and as of this writing it was close to being in the top 400,000, so there is progress.

If you haven't ordered yet, you can click on the photo here and it will take you to Amazon where you can grab the paperback or the E-Book.

Thanks to those who have already purchased the book, and to those who will.

As always, autographs are free if we run into each other.

Recently I read that less than 2% of high school athletes go on to play Division I sports. That's one in 57. I was in that 2% at the University of Massachusetts from 1970 to 1972 as a member of their intercollegiate soccer team.

I did not have a lot of skill, I had some. And I did not have a lot of experience, I had some.

But I had plenty of effort, and I made the team with effort, and then had a zig-zag career, also due to effort, or lack of awareness about my effort.

I was not a star in any sport I ever played, but I did learn a lot of lessons that helped me in my business and family careers. This weblog is about something I learned the hard way on the fields across from the Boyden Building wearing the maroon and white of the UMass Minutemen.

We fool ourselves all the time, saying, thinking or believing that we tried our best, worked our hardest or gave maximum effort. Sometimes when we say, think or believe that, we are wrong. 

Most of the time when we are wrong, we learn we were wrong after the fact. History proves we were wrong, or a similar situation comes up that proves we were wrong, or we take another look and use a different ruler. The conclusion is the same: we were wrong.

When I was a college soccer player, I thought, believed, and told people I tried my best, but learned the hard way, in consecutive years, that I was wrong, but you can judge for yourself. Several details of this story and several of the photos have been shared in other Weblogs.

At the University of Massachusetts, when I played, everyone was a walk-on. I was a very long shot to make the freshman team since I was only a one-year player in high school who didn’t start and didn’t play a whole lot in games. I originally wanted to play ice hockey in college and got a partial scholarship from a Division-3 school but turned it down to go away to Amherst for my education.

During the freshman physical at Umass, due to my almost blindness in my right eye, the doctor barely passed me, but indicated that he was passing me only for soccer. He indicated that if I was going to play ice hockey, he’d have flunked me. 

In that moment of time, I realized that my ice hockey career was over, and if I was going to continue to play sports, soccer would be the only way.

That first day of freshman practice when 85 walk-ons showed up, the freshman coach had us all run a couple of laps around the athletic fields. That short two-mile jaunt resulted in only 25 kids showing up for the second day of practice, and I was one of them.

With six weeks until the first game with Tufts University, I had plenty of time to practice and dive into my new ‘primary’ sport of soccer. I tried my best. Worked my hardest. Gave maximum effort. 

As a result, I was named a starting halfback/midfielder and co-captain. Sweet. It was even better when one of my best friends from high school was named co-captain at Tufts and we went out on the field together for that first game to take the coin toss with our families looking on.

Personally, I had a very successful season, honed my skills, and successfully avoided drinking on Friday nights, not an easy thing to do at college at the time. Or still today? 

I avoided that activity because at Saturday morning practices the coaches had us do extensive heading drills, and heading drills with a hangover were not, and probably are still not, enjoyable.

By the end of that first year when the Freshman season was over, the other co-captain and I were invited to practice with the Varsity, although not play in games, for the rest of the year. Very, very, very cool for a kid who didn’t play much in high school and was now making his way towards the big time. 

For the record, when I attended college, freshman were not eligible to play Varsity sports. Yes, both basketball hall of famer Julius Erving, Dr. J, and I were denied that same opportunity at Umass in consecutive years.

My sophomore year on the soccer team turned out to be the best season for me, until it wasn’t. We had a talented team and our record of 7-2-2 was the best for the school’s soccer team since 1932.

We only gave up 10 goals in 11 games and had 5 shutouts. We finished the season ranked 4^th in New England and 20^th in the country but were passed over for an NCAA Tournament bid to one of the two teams we’d lost to during the season, Worcester Polytechnical Institute.

A single goal cost us the chance to play in that tournament.

Still, our hope and optimism for the next season was at an all-time high until one day at Spring Practice in 1971, my world changed when the previously referenced Julius Erving, a national star, decided to leave school after his Junior Year. He signed a professional contract with the Virginia Squires of the fledgling American Basketball Association. (The NBA didn’t allow early signings, but the new league had a hardship clause and Julius jumped at the chance). 

How did that impact me? The Varsity Soccer Coach was also the Assistant Basketball Coach and called us together at that Spring practice shortly after the announcement and indicated he was leaving as well to become the Athletic Director at the Coast Guard Academy because the time was right. Umass Basketball had peaked and the time for him to advance his career would never be better.

I was crushed because obviously he thought a lot of me, and now I would have to start over. Not sure if I felt sorry for myself, or I was too sure of myself, but that announcement set in motion a two-year cycle that wasn’t fun but taught me a lot about myself.

The coach who took over was a Graduate Student that didn’t know his ass from his elbow. Maybe the worst coach I’d ever worked with. My promising Junior year, where I and my teammates expected another national ranking and I assumed I would be a starter for the second year in a row because of my sophomore performance, began with me buried on the bench. This status, to my thinking at the time, was due to the ineptitude of the coach and had nothing to do with me. A couple of years later, my thinking changed, slightly.

The new coach wasn’t impressed with me during pre-season practices, apparently, and that was why I was on the bench. He put me in near the end of the first game, and, apparently, I played well enough to play almost every minute of every game the rest of the season. I was back personally, but the team was not.

The season was a disaster, compared to our hopes and expectations, and when it was over, a bunch of players met with the Athletic Director and provided him with background information about the season. Apparently, it was enough to have the coach replaced.

During Spring practice that next year, we met our third coach in three years, a Brit, and former professional ‘football’ player in England. He totally, completely, and unequivocally changed our method of play, our defense, our offense and our priorities. Amongst ourselves, we were wondering if it was the same sport. All of us sucked, according to the new coach. Can you see where this is going?

My promising Senior year, where I and my teammates expected me to be in the starting line-up because of my two-year track record began with me buried on the bench, again. This status, to my thinking at the time, was due to the ineptitude of the coach and had nothing to do with me. A couple of years later, my thinking changed, slightly.

The coach wasn’t impressed with me during practices, apparently, and that was why I was on the bench. He put me in near the end of the first game, and, apparently, I played well enough to play almost every minute of every game the rest of the season. I was back personally, but the team was not.

The season was not a disaster, we had a winning record, but when it was over, the Brit decided that college students were not his ‘cup of tea,’ and resigned.

So, I had three years of intercollegiate soccer experience, and two of those years I started as a second stringer but ended up a starter. 

Upon reflection, I realized years later that it wasn’t all because of the coaches, it was more about me. 

There was something about my intensity wearing gray practice shorts and shirts that wasn’t the same when I put on the maroon uniform with the number 18 on the back. 

During pre-season practice, I was sure that I was trying hard. I was sure that I was intense. I was sure that I was doing my best. The reality was that I was not, and I was not playing to my full capacity.

We all know metaphors about rising to the occasion where a sports star comes through in a big moment with a lot of pressure on her or him. What we rarely discuss is performance when the pressure isn’t on. Without the roar of the crowd (only kidding, the crowds weren’t that big), or the school uniform, sometimes it is hard for us to…try hard enough?

After leaving school, I thought more and more about the zig-zag my soccer playing career had taken and slowly began to realize that, while the coaches did impact things, I had an even bigger impact on the course of events. 

Maybe I was a little too satisfied with my prior year’s performance and took my status for granted? With a new coach each year, who didn’t care about what I did before, my satisfaction didn’t matter. The same thing can happen in the world of work when we are transferred or get a new supervisor who doesn't care about what we did last year. Who knew that my college experience would prepare me for life this way?

Maybe I didn’t quite give 110% during those preseason practices with practice grays on and no one in the stands? Without the adrenaline of real games, what I thought was full out effort probably wasn’t. The same thing can happen in the world of work when no one is watching us. Who knew that my college experience would prepare me to work hard when no one was watching?

I think the lesson learned from this experience is easy to state. When you are looking for a reason that something didn't go right or the way you wanted it to go, or you are looking for someone to blame for your situation, you can save yourself a lot of time if you start by looking in the mirror.