Good Morning, Stumpers!

The iconic Al Pacino speech from Any Given Sunday told us everything we ever needed to know (watch here). Life is a game of inches. One inch too slow, and who knows what will happen. It’s cinematic that Game 7 of the World Series in the bottom of the ninth in a tie game came down to inches! Can’t believe we already made it to November. Didn’t Ohio State just win the CFP a few weeks ago?

Happy Monday!

Stump Story / Glue Of The Day

🧱 Little Things in Big Moments

No matter the sport, activity, or occupation…as the stakes rise, so does the importance of the little things. The mundane. If you want stakes, how about the bottom of the ninth with bases loaded in Game 7 of the World Series in a tie game on your home turf? 🤯 

We all had that moment at the park or on the driveway where we were pretending it the championship game, and we just had to make one shot. We do the fake countdown…

”3….2…..1…..HE SHOOTS…..”

Just to mimic in the slightest what is it to have the biggest game on the line, and the moment resting on your shoulders.

This one is going to be remembered for a while: the 2025 World Series.

There are so many different things that can be highlighted. We could talk about the double play to end game 6. We could talk about the missed opportunity in the 18-inning slugfest a week ago. In game 7 alone, it seems like there were 10 things.

The Springer double up in the first. The 3 HRs let up in the eighth or later.

The Isiah Kiner-Falefa (IKF) lead and slide in the ninth.

At the end of the day, who am I to criticize those moments? The biggest thing this shows me is why practice should be boring, and why it should be the same thing over and over again. You practice situations, so in the game, no matter the stakes, you are ready.

Is that fair? I don’t know. Bottom of the ninth in Game 7 of the World Series…everybody is juiced up a little, adrenaline is pumping, you’re potentially 30 seconds away from baseball immortality.

I think it is fair.

The importance of the little things is so important. Just for one second, let’s talk about the IKF lead. When Yamamoto winds up and then releases the ball, all baseball fans will tell you the runners on base should take what we call a ‘secondary lead’, which means just moving closer to the next base, even by a foot or two.

When Yamamoto released the ball…IKF didn’t move a muscle.

When he started running after the ball was hit to the infield, he seemed like he still may have had a chance. After a slow-mo replay, when he had been called out at the plate, it turns out he didn’t need two feet, but instead just a few inches.

Nuts!

Game 6 ended with a base-running error as well, and surely that may have been in the minds of the coaching staff, but man oh man a tough way to go. It is never just about one play. In all four losses, there are things that can be pointed at that could’ve changed the outcome of this series.

This is about baseball, but it’s never just about baseball.

Even in our own lives, when the lights get bright, we just have to remember the process and trust the work we have put in. If we start playing scared, we may not love the result.

Of! The! Day’s!

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