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Touchdown!
Hats way off to Pittsburgh Steelers owner Dan Rooney. Most owners treat players like chattel. Yet Rooney says he won't try to change Ben Roethlisberger's contract to add a "no motorcycle riding" clause. He apparently assumes that Big Ben will respond to his horrendous accident like an adult—and presumably behave in a prudent fashion. This little sports news item really made an impact on me.
Touchdown, Dan Rooney.* (*Probably no surprise—the Rooneys have long been exemplary owners.)
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Sir Alex Ferguson - Manager of Manchester United and a hero of mine has perfected the idea of treating the top stars in football (soccer) like adults rather than children and he has always got the best out of some supposed 'wayward stars' such as Eric Cantona and Roy Keane etc. He treats them as adults and if they respond like adults they survive at the club with Sir Alex but it seems if they step out of line they have to go - that sounds very fair to me.
Posted by Trevor Gay at August 9, 2006 4:56 PM
The probably unreported piece of this story is that Ben's not wearing a helmet was a matter of concern long before it became an issue when he (helmetless), his motorcycle and the vehicle of a lady making an unexpected left turn all came violently together leaving him with potentially life threatening injuries. He'd been treated as an adult prior and perhaps he didn't meet those expectations. Yup, we certainly expect that he'll come around this time. He has an opportunity to first, demonstrate that he learned and second, serve as the proverbial "role model" to say that sometimes listening to someone else and not assuming the arrogant position of "it won't happen to me so don't tell me" is the way to go.
Posted by Ed Di Gangi at August 10, 2006 8:29 AM
An old professor of mine Giorgio Inzerelli was fond of saying: You can bring a horse to the water, but you cannot make it drink.
Perhaps Dan Rooney and Sir Alex Ferguson have figured out how to make each "individual" player deliver on commitments - the analogy of making the horse drink.
Perhaps Dan Rooney may have acted differently with another player?
Posted by Arun Sadhashivan at August 10, 2006 9:44 AM
A 7-hour medical operation - hopefully sober UP/raise IQ of Q-back Ben for future endeavors!
Posted by sean at August 10, 2006 11:07 AM
I appreciate the concept of leading a horse to water. In the case of Mr. Rooney, he and "Big Ben" are lucky there wasn't a change of horse necessitated by the decision to not try to make the horse drink.
Posted by Ed Di Gangi at August 10, 2006 11:22 AM
Astute comments Arun - and spot on!
Posted by Trevor Gay at August 10, 2006 6:23 PM