We’re Going to State!
My niece, Haley, is a freshman in high school. She is a tennis player. She is the first girl in the history of her school to win the sectional tournament. The fantastic thing is that she beat every opponent 6-0, 6-0. She was never in danger of dropping a single game.
Haley made the state tournament. Again, she is the first freshman in her school’s history to do so. In her first-round match, Haley plays the defending state champion. Can she win? Can he beat the state champion? Yes, she can. This post is not about Haley’s attempt to win a state championship as a freshman; not really. This post is about expectations.
Haley’s high school has five state titles in ‘20-’21 alone. That is five titles in various sports in a single calendar year, and, of course, the year is not over. That is mighty good. Back when I was in high school, the prospect of a state title was never mentioned for any sport. The thought of a league title mainly was out of the question. During my four years of high school, our football team did not win a game. Some people claim that we won one, but I don’t remember us winning any at all.
At Haley’s school, the student-athletes are expected to make the honor roll and compete for state championships. Not all schools expect such things from their students. Mine certainly didn’t. I know this much; it is easier to excel when surrounded by people with high expectations. Especially when those expectations are for you and everyone else in their sphere of influence. That makes all the difference. Trust me, I do know a little about this topic.
When I was young, about 12 or 13, I decided that the way people used baseball statistics was deeply flawed. I was especially dubious of ERA (earned run average) for relief pitchers and batting average for hitters. I knew there was a better way to rank success or failure for the players, so I set out to fix it. I came up with numerous equations to better address the value of a given player. Of course, when I showed all my work to my coaches and teachers, they all sighed a big sigh and more or less told me I was wasting my time. Such is the fate of a person being taught by people who strived to only be mediocre. And I must say, a middling existence as a teacher or mentor was well out of their range.
I often say that the thing I needed more than anything else when I was a kid is the 50-year-old version of me. That guy had a handle on lots of different things. Had he been around, today I might be considered the father of modern-day sports analytics. That is not a joke. Instead, I am just a dude sitting at a keyboard.
The fifty-year-old version of me would have immediately taken the 12-year-old kid and put him on intellectual steroids. That youngster would have been encouraged until the ideas became fully realized. A nudge here, an introduction to a statistics professor there, you get the idea. The older version of me knew what proper expectations were. The 12-year-old kid didn’t know anything about anything, and more importantly, neither did his coaches and teachers.
Haley has a much better situation. Obviously, right? I talked to her and her brother about Harvard ever since they were big enough to listen. I still tell them stories today about that one place where expectations need not be explicitly stated; they are implied. No matter what else may happen in your life, it is understood that you have an obligation to become the best version of yourself possible. And while you are at it, making the world a better place is considered an everyday goal.
Haley’s life at this point is much different than mine was. When I was a kid, I had a few uncles who ended up drinking themselves to death. Sure, a couple of the others were hard-working family men who were always nice to me. Even though I enjoyed being around them, I am not sure there was any inspiration for me to be found. Those men, either drunk or sober, certainly did not have any expectations for me. And I’ll say this with great confidence, I know it never occurred to my parents that any of their kids would get a degree (or two) from Harvard. It was out of the question. After all, my mom was a coal miner’s daughter, and both sides of my family came from the hills of West Virginia. I recently did some work and found out something interesting on my dad’s side of the family. Not only was my dad the first person to graduate from high school, but he was also the first person in the family tree to even attend high school.
Haley has it much better than I did; that is a simple statement of fact. And that is the way it should be, right? Uneducated “sons of the soil” have been transformed into competent (and excellent) teachers and coaches who can actually help her instead of hindering her athletic and intellectual development.
My point is a simple one. I was discouraged by a bunch of people who passed themselves off as authority figures. I now know these people had no idea what they were talking about. On the other hand, Haley gets to compete for a state championship as a freshman in high school. She will have every opportunity to attend a first-rate university and pursue her tennis career and any academic course of study that she wants to. The expectation level was raised for her. Perhaps more importantly, she isn’t being taught and coached by ignorant “sons of the soil,” as I was. If they ever call and ask, I can assure the people at Harvard that I have done my best to meet my obligations as a graduate. I’ll just tell them that my niece is going to the state tennis tournament as a freshman; they will infer the rest.
