Playing To Win

Baseball in the Netherlands will never be the same. In the 1st round of the World Baseball Championships the Netherlands faced a heavily favored and vastly better team from the Dominican Republic. With 2 MLB players on their roster, compared to the Domincan’s 23, the Netherlands were not even expected to score a run. But after beating the Domincans in game one of the best out of three series, they were starting to turn some heads. Still, baseball has fluke games like that right? Felipe Alou, manager of the Domnicans thought so. He is even quoted as saying, “There’s a team we should’ve beaten 9-0″. All that did was fire up the Netherlands players that much more. They came out in game two of the series to take down the World Baseball Championship favorites.

The salary of the Dominican Republic players totaled $83.4 million while the Netherland’s totaled $.4 million. It was truly a David vs. Goliath game. But the Netherlands came out with nothing to lose and something to prove. They played to win, instead of playing not to lose. Conversely, the Domincans had a difficult time countering the attack of the Netherlands. The intensity, focus and determination of the Netherland players was enough to get them the win. In 11 innings, the Netherland team eventually came out on top, changing the way that youth in the Netherlands will look at baseball forever. Because they played to win.

Live is meant to be lived. Meant to be enjoyed. Meant to be passionate and full of purpose. I’m going to echo Nike’s slogan today and say, “Just Do It”. Go out and live life with purpose and play to win. Have a great day…