The Men on the Bench
It takes more than five players to make a winning team. The
starting five may win a game, but it takes the whole team to win
the championship—to go all the way. The team is really like an
iceberg. You see the starting five, but underneath it all is that big,
wide, strong base—the rest of the team. This is the part of the
team that builds the character of a lasting winner. The more
dedicated the man on the end of the bench, the harder he works,
the more he pushes and strengthens the starting player—the higher
he pushes the iceberg out of the water—the bigger it gets—the
better the team. If he quits, doesn’t give his all or becomes
complacent in his position he erodes that strong base and erodes
the character of the team. He contributes to the errors in a tense,
one point game, he is partly to blame for the mental lapse with four
minutes to play in that big rivalry, he undermines the total effort
necessary for the team to come back from a ten point deficit in a
championship game. And yet this player on the bench must be
there—watching, waiting and hoping sometimes agonizingly for
that chance to use his special skill to better the team effort—to make
the base of that iceberg stronger—to help build the character of the
team. Yes, agonizingly because he knows there is a chance he
won’t play because he is the smallest man waiting to break open the
press or he may be the big man called in an instant to shut down
the unusually big center who is hurting the team inside. He may
even be the man that is hurt but working twice as hard to be
physically fit in time for the playoffs. He may be the man on the
bench who demonstrates to the fans that his team really has
character from the bench to the basket. But even more important,
he may be the whole bench that the player looks to late in the game
when he is hurting, out of breath and burning inside for the spirit
that pushes that enthusiasm and that love necessary to make the big
play and win the game for the whole team.
When the game is over, when the season ends and all the fans and
sports writers are talking about the top of the iceberg, the stars and
heroes, the players will know the real winner is the team, the whole
iceberg. Especially the base, the men on the bench who build the
character to make the team a lasting winner.