While football is arguably the greatest team sport there is, there are other sports that have important team components. As we closely approach the ‘Dog Days of August’ for the major league baseball season, ESPN’s top ten has highlight after highlight of amazing plays by amazing players.

But last night’s number one top play was a play by a teammate that saved his fellow player. There is no faster and greater jump from despair to elation that when you make an error or bad play, only to be saved in the next instant by your teammate.

This crazy play last night in the Pirate’s game goes to show that teammates in the right place at the right time can make a huge difference. Check out this link to see the #1 play.

A second string quarterback is one of the most difficult positions int he game of football. A backup quarterback has to work equally as hard and be just as prepared as the starting qb, yet may never see the field in the course of game. Furthermore, the backup quarterback must be ready at a moment’s notice to step in and take over.

There are lots of great stories of starting quarterbacks going down and backup qbs that come in and lead their teams to victory. There are others whose stories have not gone so well. I have been on both sides of those stories.

I can remember my freshmen year of college when the starting quarterback when down for the season and I had to come into the game and try and win it. I think my first collegiate pass probably sailed over the receivers head by 10 feet. But the same receiver, a veteran guy, ran up to me and looked at me and said, “Just do what you’ve been doing in practice and you’ll be fine”.

This brief statement made me realize that, while the heat of the battle in the middle of a game is more intense that a practice will ever be, I had been successful enough in practice to earn the backup role and was now capable of being successful and leading the team to a win. The receivers calm and encouraging words gave me confidence to play well the rest of the game, and we got the win.

You and I are always preparing for the big moments of our lives. The question is, when the big moment comes, when we’re ‘put into the game’ or ‘given our shot’ have we worked hard enough and prepared well enough to be able to succeed when it matters? Take a lesson from a career backup, you want to be ready when they call your name. Sharpen your skills and hone your abilities so that when its your chance, you reveal the teammate and leader that you have always been.

Sports are entertainment. They evoke the deepest truths of humanity in the form of game and athletic drama. The American Sports Industry has capitalized on sports as entertainment and markets and makes billions of dollars on athletes and sports as entertainment.

But the fine line between sports and entertainment can become a blurry one. And where is the line drawn when players want to get in on the entertainment side of sports?

Twitter is an up and coming social network that is taking the world by storm. The abbreviated version of Facebook allows people the opportunity to ‘tweet’ about what they are doing, links or pictures they want to share with others, and have furthered to progress of social network interfaces. Celebrities and others are using Twitter to get their name out in another way.

Chad ‘Ochocinco’ is an athlete that has used twitter to talk with fans and give them an insight into his life as a NFL athlete. In a recent interview, Ochocinco said that, as related to getting involved, “And when the season starts, it’s going to get even worse. I’m going to really make it fun. I’m using Twitter during games. I’m using Twitter during half time. I’m using it after games. I’m taking it to the next level.”

The NFL is not impressed with his statement. Cell phones are banned on sidelines for various reasons. So it will be interesting to see the choice that Ochocinco will make. Will he be more of a team guy on the field, and promote himself in between plays on Twitter?

We’re curious what you guys think? Is Twitter worth being fined?

As we continue the EverydayQB challenge, the weight loss may not be where I want it to be, but striving to develop a healthy and sustainable workout plan is still the pressing aim. As I’ve mentioned before, while growing up and during college football, I had the luxury of others and outside forces motivating me to stay healthy and to be in shape. Now that my days as a college athlete are over, the motivation is more difficult, more abstract. Yet just as important as working out to perform my best on the field is the need to be a healthy individual for the long haul. I’ve got a lot of life left to live and the patterns and plans I establish now will follow me through the rest of my life.

Many of you might be in similar positions: Wanting to have a solid and successful workout plan but not knowing where to get started. Here are four things that every plan should incorporate:

1. Consistency: Whatever plan you create, only a consistent and concentrated effort will produce results. Set a reasonable, consistent goal that can be achieved, whether that is the decision to work out for three days a week or four. The goal is to make your workout plan a habit of your weekly schedule. Consistency will provide the training that your body needs to begin adjusting to your new and healthy life.
2. Creativity: Your work out plan should have a variety of different lifts and exercises. You may have a few favorites that you enjoy doing each time you work out, but there are multiple ways to exercise the same muscles. Furthermore, the variations in exercises can work minor muscles that may be missed in other lifts. Creativity also provides a freshness to your workouts and prevents the feeling of being in a rut or stuck in the same routine.
3. Balance: Any time you’re lifting weights, balance should always be in the forefront of your mind. What I mean by balance is that if you spend 10 minutes working your chest, you should also spend 10 minutes working you upper back. 10 minutes on biceps, then 10 minutes on triceps. You get the idea. Balancing your workouts so that you work all of the necessary muscle groups for positive general health is important. Likewise, you should balance between Cardiovascular and Muscle toning exercises. For most people, a successful workout plan produces a balanced, healthy person, not a body builder with bulging biceps. Stay balanced in your workout.
4. Enjoyment: There may be days when going to the gym is that last thing on planet earth that you want to do, but the majority of the time you should enjoy your time at the gym. Exercise releases positive chemicals into your body and leaves you feeling energized and alive. Exercise with a buddy, take your iPod, do lifts and workouts that are enjoyable and make you feel good. You will work out on a more consistent basis if you enjoy your work outs.

Those are some basic tips to get you started on your workout plan. Summer is a great time to develop those healthy workout habits. Happy Exercising!

It seems to me like high school sports are becoming more and more like a business. Summers are consumed by American Legion Baseball, or Summer League Basketball, this football camp or that, a tennis tournament every weekend. I can remember the summers of high school, running from a baseball game to a basketball game, then to tennis practice and football drills, finally crawling into bed that night just to get up and do it again. Of feeling pressure from coaches to work with their team that summer, year round even. High School student athletes are working harder than every before on their game so that they can have a shot at a college scholarship. Often times, parents reinforce their kids drive to compete and perform day in and day out so that they can be the best player they can for the college scouts.

Many student athletes make the choice to give up playing multiple sports in order to concentrate on the sport they have the best chance to succeed in.

But do single sport players have a better chance of getting college scholarships that multi-sport athletes? Which makes a better person?

Let me put forward my bias at this point. All throughout growing up and throughout high school I played four sports. Each season brought a new sport, new challenges, new chances to improve my game in that particular sport. So, obviously, I’m a bit partial to the multi-sport side of this tough question. But there have been times when I’ve looked back on my sports careers and my college football career and wondered to myself, ‘If I would have given up every sport but football, would I have been a better quarterback? Would I have played somewhere else? Would I have had a shot at the league?’

I think many people look back on their sports experiences and wonder those things, and hindsight is always 20/20. But after I ask those questions, I think about all of the experiences I had playing baseball, basketball and tennis. I think about the relationships I built with teammates, the places we traveled, the epic contests I was a part of. I think about how those experiences shaped me into the person that I am today, how each sport trained different parts of my body and my mind to be a whole person, and how I will be able to pass on a love of each of those sports, and others, to my kids and other student athletes. I wouldn’t trade those other sports for a better football career, because, in the end; sports, school, religion, family life, is all about forming a better, more whole person. That should be the aim of parents and coaches, not a college scholarship. Because college and professional sports are an unrealistic goal for most, and at best, a short lived dream compared to the rest of life that is to be lived. I would hope that the parents of America would shape their kids to become better people first, before they become better athletes.

That’s how I feel. What do you think?

A few months ago I started the EverydayQB challenge of getting into shape and losing weight. About a month later, my wife and I found out we were pregnant! Two weeks later we found out we were having twins! This chain of events has led to one of the most exciting and life-changing times in our lives and we are thrilled.

It always seems, however, that when life-changing events occur, our patterns and goals must be altered and, for a time, can lapse. Such was the case with my eating and exercise goals. For the first few months, I felt like I was eating for two as well. Consequently, the whole weight loss thing has flown out the window. I found myself encouraging my wife to eat often, and then I was cleaning up after her, eating her leftovers.

What I am starting to realize is how to be a supportive husband without being the garbage disposal. I can safely say that I am ‘back on the wagon’ eating healthy each day and exercising regularly and am getting better at not having to finish my wife’s food. In the same way, now that her first trimester is over, her appetite is back and hopefully will continue to grow over the next six months.

Through this process, I am learning that even though life circumstances might change or events occur, we must stick with our goals and plans to maintain some sort of sanity and regularity in our lives.

The world of sports is saturated with stats. Stats about what players have done in certain situations, stats about completion percentages and batting averages, stats about how many times a team has ran this play on this down or converted this drive into a touchdown, stats about how often a coach gets doused with gatorade, and the list goes on and on and on. Stats are a great way to measure the ‘success’ of a game or team and we used stats often on our college team.

As an offense, our 3rd down conversion percentage was important, as well as our running average and scoring in the redzone. The turnover ratio and total yard comparison could usually indicate how the game was won and what might have made the difference.

But what I realized after reading those stats and hearing the reports is that during the game, in the intensity of each play, you’re not worried about stats or percentages, you’re not thinking about how many times you’ve converted on third down before this or if you’re going to score in the red zone. Instead, you’re focused on performing on that play to the best of your ability. Statistics might reflect the overall flow of a football game, but it is the every play effort of an athlete that determines the success of a team.

Life is lived the same way. You can look back on your life and overanalyze it with statistics. What kinds of grades did you get, where’d you go to college, what is your salary, what position do you have in your company and where are you headed. But we still have to live one day at a time. We can’t live it any faster than that and I don’t think I’d want to. It is the play of everyday that changes our lives, the effort to be the best person today that you can be. That is all that matters. Everyday is new, everyday an opportunity to live a life of honor, love and success. Live today to its fullest.

As promised, let’s take a look at some of the most interesting quarterback races in the NFL this fall. QB competitions are difficult to assess and understand, but certain key factors are important to note. Unfortunately, in the world of the NFL, the business side of the game enters into the equation perhaps more than it should. Here are some breakdowns and predictions:

Cleveland Browns: Quinn or Andersen?
The Browns are in a tough spot. They have two comparable and competent quarterbacks who have had moderate success with their organization. But my nod goes to Brady Quinn, simply because the Browns have invested a lot more in Quinn than they have in Andersen. They’ll keep Andersen around as motivation for Quinn to continue to play well and work hard, but Andersen has had his chance to cement himself into the starting role and hasn’t done so. Quinn will start.

New York Jets: Sanchez or Clemens?
Having a rookie quarterback start is always a risk, but Joe Flaco and the New York Jets will take it. Because of Flaco’s success last year with a rookie quarterback, he will take a chance on Sanchez and his decision will payoff. Sanchez is the most prepared and seasoned of the rookie quarterbacks and will have a successful rookie season.

Detroit Lions-Culpepper or Stafford?
Now things get trickier. Matthew Stafford was the number one draft pick and considered by many scouts as the qb most prepared for the NFL. But Culpepper has been a proven success in the league and could perhaps revive the struggling Lions organization. However, the Lions are struggling for a reason. While I think Culpepper would be a better choice, look for the Lions to give Stafford the reins. Unfortunately for Stafford, Detroit is a black hole for rookie quarterbacks and things will not go well. Stafford has a chance if he takes the opportunity to learn from Culpepper in training camp and the Lions give Stafford the leash of a decent learning curve before mounting all of the pressure and expectations onto him that they have to rookie qbs in the past.

With these quarterback competitions and many others around the league, the tension between putting fans in the seats and winning games is an interesting dilemma. People want to see their favorite players, the ones that have been drafted and are rookies out of college, but winning games is more important in the long run. The Jets will fare the best, not only because Sanchez is a better quarterback than Stafford, but because their defense will provide the support that Sanchez needs to find is feet in the big leagues.

The world of football had its heart broken this weekend with the news of the passing of quarterback Steve McNair. McNair was found dead in his apartment with another woman also found deceased. Police yesterday ruled the shooting a homicide and are currently investigating the circumstances surrounding the shooting.

McNair was a great quarterback and an even great member of society. According to Yahoo News, “Generous, he frequently took part in charity work for both the Titans and later the Baltimore Ravens after a 2006 trade. McNair even helped load donated food, water and clothes onto tractor-trailers that he had arranged for Hurricane Katrina victims, and paid for three football camps for children himself this year.” McNair also recently opened a recent near his college alma mater to provide healthy, affordable food to college students.

McNair’s football career was impressive. McNair led the Titans to the 2000 Super Bowl, which they lost 23-16 to the St. Louis Rams despite his 87-yard drive in the final minute and 48 seconds. He was co-MVP of the NFL with Colts quarterback Peyton Manning in 2003.

Manning said in a statement Sunday that he had some great battles with the quarterback.

“Sharing the NFL MVP honor with him in 2003 was special because of what a great football player he was,” Manning said. “I had the opportunity to play in a couple of Pro Bowls with him, and the time spent with him in Hawaii I’ll never forget. I’ll truly miss him.”

The Titans drafted Vince Young in 2006 to replace McNair, who had mentored him since he was a teenager. They never played together but did play against each other that year.

“He was like a father to me. I hear his advice in my head with everything I do. Life will be very different without him,” Young said in a statement Sunday.

Whatever the circumstances surrounding McNair’s passing, it should not diminish the things that he gave to so many people. The media and our world has a tendency to judge people based on one scandal or situation, instead of looking at the whole of a life and the things they did to make a difference in our world. Steve McNair, you will be missed and our thoughts and prayers are with your family during this difficult time.