On a late October night in 2011, I watched a baseball game from a TV news studio.
The evening newscast I’d worked on had just wrapped up. But the World Series game that was airing on a different channel had not.
One of the teams in that World Series was the Texas Rangers. They were the “local” team – as the city I was in didn’t have a big-league squad. They were also my favorite team.
The game was nearly over, and the Rangers had a lead. A win would mean the team’s first-ever championship.
And so, I watched intently on a flatscreen next to the anchor podium. My colleagues gathered around me, ready to celebrate.
The Rangers got to within one pitch of sealing the win. But the opposing batter swung at that pitch and drove the ball to the outfield.
It looked like Texas’ outfielder might catch the ball to win the title. But it eluded his glove and rolled to the outfield wall. Two runners scored. The game was tied.
The Texas Rangers would go on to lose the game, and ultimately the World Series. It was a gut punch, but I refused to hang my head.
It’s alright, I told myself. They’ll be back real soon, and these guys will get it done.
How wrong I was.
The mulligan.
It’s a time-honored tradition.
Golfers have long requested a mulligan – essentially a do-over – if one of their shots went awry. And that practice has extended beyond the course in recent years.
A second chance provides hope. Hope for a better outcome. Hope for redemption.
But winning strategies are not built on hope. And they shouldn’t be built on second chances either.
Opportunities, you see, are not governed by our control. We can put ourselves in position to seize them should they arise. But there’s no guarantee they will.
This is doubly true for second opportunities. To get another bite of the apple, we need everything to align just right. And that rarely happens.
We can talk about doing better next time. But expecting there to be a next time is foolhardy.
The randomness of all this can be cruel. There are surely some who seize their third, fourth, even fifth chances. All while others are left with the memories of the one that got away.
But such is life.
Don’t be fooled. The mulligan is anything but an inevitability.
When I was in college, I wrecked my car.
Like so many accidents, the specifics of this crash were complicated. But the state of my vehicle was unambiguous. It was totaled.
In the days after the wreck, I called in favors to get from my house to campus and back. But I knew this wasn’t a strategy that would last long-term. And I was way too poor to buy a new car.
Just as panic started to cloud my mind, my parents called. They had recently bought a new sedan. And they’d had planned on surprising me with their old one as a graduation gift. But given the recent events, they’d decided to move that timeline up.
My father told me he’d bring the car down to me on one condition. This would be the only car gifted to me. If I wrecked it, I’d be on my own.
It would have been all too easy to ignore this warning. After all, second chances were all around me.
The federal government had recently bailed out the banking system and major automakers. Many of my classes allowed me to drop my lowest test score to boost my grade.
Still, I knew my father wasn’t kidding. So, I took his words as gospel. And I made the most of my opportunity.
I consistently played it safe behind the wheel. I drove defensively and strove to avoid risks. By the time I traded in the car six years later, it had nary a scratch on it.
By then, I was a full-fledged adult, with a steady income and an unwavering sense of responsibility. I’d come to recognize that second chances didn’t grow on trees. While I could make some minor mistakes, I could not blow the opportunities I was given.
For if I did, there’d be few chances at redemption.
Not long before this article was posted, the Texas Rangers broke through.
The team returned to the World Series and claimed its first championship.
Jubilation abounded. The Rangers had made the most of their second chance.
But had they really?
If you ran a quick check, you’d find exactly zero players from that 2011 team on the championship roster. Only one coach was on both squads.
Those guys who I thought would get back to the World Series and get it done — well, they never did. An entirely different group broke through. One unencumbered by the past.
Yes, this was the first opportunity on the big stage for many players. Others had succeeded under the bright lights before. Hardly any needed redemption.
It was the rest of us — the owners, the field staff, the broadcasters, and the fans — who yearned for another opportunity. But we didn’t swing a bat or throw a pitch. We never crossed the chalk lines into the field of play.
Our contribution was passionate, but it was ultimately passive.
Such is the nature of the second chance mirage. Lightning might strike twice, but it will rarely incinerate the same dirt both times.
We are more transitory than the structures we build. That makes it challenging for the moment to find us again. And that causes second chances to go up in smoke.
Yes, counting on mulligans is like wishing on stars. The return on our investment is low.
It’s far better for us to focus on seizing the moment at hand. On making the most of our opportunity the first time around. And on turning the page should things fail to work out.
This is sustainable. This is realistic. This is the most prudent way forward.
I’m ready to make this shift. Are you?