The Stater code from the first week of the season is “constant progression.” If you speak Japanese, or are a Toyota Motors enthusiast, you will recognize this as the term kaizen.
Our coaching staff rallies around the analogy of getting one percent better every day. If we can do that, soon enough we will be miles ahead of where we started.
Thinking of our squad as a stock in the market gives way to an analogy that I think sums it up: It is our job to make sure that our stock goes up every day. It doesn’t have to rise twenty-five percent every day (that’s unrealistic—even with the market coming back around); it just needs to go up. Why? Because the steady stocks are the ones that people invest in.
This past weekend brought us down South to Mississippi State. Just the accents alone were enough for some culture shock—come time for the grits and catfish and we were looking at a team full of rookies.
The hospitality was awesome. From the bus drivers to the hotel staff at the front desk, everyone was doing their part to make sure we enjoyed our stay.
We didn’t leave Pullman with a number of games in our heads that we were looking to win (though three is always nice). We left for this trip with the sole purpose of playing as a team and competing to our best ability—placing the focus on the process rather than the outcome.
Big ups to all of our arms, especially the young bucks! We are excited to get out the spud buckets and lunch pales and work on our stock for a week before our home opener this weekend.
Oh, and this post (I still hate to call it a blog) has gone on too long to not have mentioned Langer. Chris Lange is our trainer (ATC certified, I might add) and is as big of a staple to our program as the team drills we run at practice. Thanks, Langer!
Tommy Richards
