It’s not easy to be a fan of the New York Mets.  R.A. Dickey understands this, and he wrote about his appreciation for the fans in a column for the New York Daily News soon after he received the National League Cy Young Award.

“It’s not always easy being a loyal supporter when a team is going through a rough stretch,” he wrote. “But to all of you Mets fans, to be a recipient of your support and passion has been one of the greatest thrills of my baseball life.”

A lot of comments that are said or written by or about pro athletes usually are not genuine. But the words from Dickey always are straight forward and honest. He is a truth-teller about his team, his performance and his life. He also is committed to helping others and he is devoted to his Christian faith.

Dickey climbed Mount Kilimanjaro to help raise money and awareness for the Bombay Teen Challenge, which rescues young girls in Mumbai, India, from abuse and sexual exploitation. In his recent book, he revealed that he was sexually abused as a child and he explained his feelings of despair, loneliness and isolation. He also mentioned his mistakes, but he also wrote about redemption and hope, and his love for his mother, his wife (who stuck by him through a sputtering baseball career) and his God.

“I was tired of hiding,” he wrote in his book. “I needed for the public person and the private person to be the same. I needed to be authentic—to be completely honest before God.”

While it may not be easy to be a fan of the New York Mets right now, it is easy to understand why so many of them are personal fans of R.A. Dickey. He appreciates everything and everyone, and he repays the success he has enjoyed by supporting others.

This season, R.A. Dickey will not play for the Mets, having been traded to the Toronto Blue Jays. We all wish him continued success and we thank him for sharing himself with New York.

We all know the line uttered by Hamlet, as written by William Shakespeare—“This above all: to thine own self be true; and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.” More of our athletes need to follow in the steps of Hamlet and Dickey. So do more of our politicians and business leaders.

Jim

A couple of months ago, as The Ohio State Buckeyes were preparing for the biggest game of the football season against Nebraska, Ohio’s third-string freshman quarterback posted a tweet that received more attention than the game.

“Why should we have to go to class if we came here to play FOOTBALL,” read the message, “we ain’t come to play SCHOOL classes are POINTLESS.”

Someone with the team or the university quickly deleted the tweet and closed the player’s Twitter account. However, since media coverage and messaging now are instantaneous, multiple media outlets already had seen the tweet. The message quickly became national news.

One sports/entertainment media outlet concluded that the tweet was “a childish and harmless act.” It was childish, but it certainly was not harmless.

Any athlete, especially one who competes on a high school, college, or pro level, must understand that the scrutiny level is high. The “no tolerance” rules that govern fighting, sportsmanship and off-the-field behavior also oversee proper use of social media. Any comment on social media can reflect poorly on a player, for a team and for a school.

After the tweet by the Ohio State athlete, OSU distributed a statement that explained the university’s social media policy:

“We allow our student-athletes the opportunity to express themselves via the social mediums,” read the statement. “What we do ask of them and communicate to them is the importance of being respectful, appropriate and aware that their communications can impact many people. We remind [our student athletes] that others may have different views and opinions on what may and may not be appropriate, so always remember not to post or tweet anything that could embarrass themselves, their team, teammates, the university, their family or other groups, organizations or people.”

The student tweeter received a one-game suspension. For him, no doubt, this was a teachable moment and a lesson learned.

On the business side, a poor, misguided, or even a malicious posting on social media can severely damage the reputation of a company. If your company does not have a mandatory social media policy for employees, seriously consider creating one immediately. You can not afford the risk of an errant comment going viral and damaging your business, your reputation and your relationship with your customers.

If you would like assistance in developing a social media policy, my team at the Whitmore Group is here to get your started.

Jim

In a few days, the Baseball Hall of Fame will announce the 2013 class of inductees. The vote is conducted by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. As in recent years, the media will have the honor of selecting, or not selecting, players who have tainted the game during the steroid era.

Baseball seems to have addressed the on-the-field issue of substance enhancement with its current drug testing program. However, some of the players suspected of enhancing their game over the last 25 years, and who broke cherished records during that time, now are beginning to appear on the Hall of Fame ballot.

Six years ago, Mark McGwire, who is suspected of steroid use, became eligible for Cooperstown. He never has received more than 24 percent of the vote (a player must appear on 75 percent of the ballots). Last year, he received just 19.5 percent. Baseball purists are concerned that McGwire continues to receive votes during each year of eligibility, and they are worried that other alleged substance abusers, as they are placed on the ballot, could receive enough votes to be enshrined with baseball’s immortals.

The 2013 ballot is a litmus test. For the first time, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Sammy Sosa—all alleged users of steroids—are eligible for the Hall of Fame. Will the same 19.5 – 24 percent who voted for McGwire also vote for these three players who set big records with their big muscles? Could more writers be swayed to vote for them? Could too many voters find excuses to open the doors to Cooperstown for these players?

Some writers believe that they should vote for players based solely on their accomplishments on the field. If, at a later time, a determination is made beyond a doubt that a player used illegal substances to enhance performance, then that player can be stripped of the honor. Many other writers refuse to vote for any player suspected of using steroids even when the proof is lacking.

All of this can be very confusing and frustrating for fans. It is the same for some of the voters, too. But, actually, there may be a better way for writers to judge and to vote.

The ballot sent to voters each year includes this statement: “Voting shall be based upon the player’s record, playing ability, integrity, sportsmanship, character and contribution to the team(s) on which the player played.”

One-half of the decision process includes the words “integrity,” “sportsmanship” and “character.” So, voting a player into Cooperstown should be no different than accepting a person as a member of a prestigious business organization or private club, or hiring a person to be part of a company. Besides accomplishments and talent, it is important to measure a person’s integrity, character and the ability to perform as a member of a team.

At the Whitmore Group, we place “integrity,” “sportsmanship” and “character” on the top of our list. With this foundation, we then help each employee develop or broaden his or her talents to benefit our entire team.

Jim

More youth sports teams are focusing on sportsmanship rather than winning games and championships. Managers, coaches, parents and the leagues realize that this has its own rewards.

I recently learned about two teams from New York that stress sportsmanship. The Sand Gnats is a little league minors division baseball team from White Plains and the Putnam Valley Tigers is an under-12 girls soccer team.

The manager of the Sand Gnats is a pastor.

“When [the pastor] informed me that my son…would be on his baseball team, I knew the focus would be about character and not about winning,” said one parent to a reporter at a local newspaper.

An example of the pastor’s teaching of sportsmanship occurred when he responded to over-zealous cheering by his players during a game. He walked to the bench and told the players that they should not make the other team feel bad, and then he said that if it continued he would forfeit the game.

From this once incident, a player later said that he learned the importance of always showing kindness. He said that it is easy to be kind when thought is given to actions and having the knowledge that words can affect others.

For the record, the team won every game, including the championship. But all the players were more satisfied that they played their games the right way—with kindness and respect for other teams.

A little farther north, the girls won the East Hudson Youth Soccer League Division 2 title. But winning was secondary for them.

“What makes this team extra special is the true sportsmanship, commitment, encouragement and love they have for each other,” said a parent about the girls on the team. “Through the good, they would laugh, jump, smile and cheer with joy. Through the bad, they would embrace one another, smile, and say, ‘It’s OK, we gave it our all.’ If one was hurt, all were hurt.”

In sports, when only winning or personal success are the end game, sometimes the biggest reward is lost—self-respect and the respect for others. The same is true in business. Whether you work with an internal team or collaborate with outside partners, mutual respect always is a winning formula that delivers rewards.

Jim

While the New York Islanders have planted their hockey sticks in Brooklyn to begin play at the Barclays Center during 2015, this will not be the first time that a professional puck has been dropped in the borough.

The Brooklyn Americans, known to fans as the Amerks, played in the borough as a last gasp before phasing into nonexistence. The team started as the New York Americans during 1925 and became the second U.S. team in the National Hockey League after the Boston Bruins. They played at a new Madison Square Garden, and they were such a hot commodity that the Garden got another team—the New York Rangers.

The Amerks were consistent losers over 15 years and had plenty of financial problems. The end of the prohibition period cut into the main business of the team’s bootlegger owner. He put the team on the market. With no takers, Bill Dwyer just walked away from the team. By 1941, the team’s manager was selling players to raise cash. To prevent the league from dropping the team, he decided to move to Brooklyn.

Unfortunately, Brooklyn did not have an arena for hockey. The 1941-1942 season was played at MSG but the practice facility was moved from New Jersey to the Brooklyn Ice Palace on Atlantic and Bedford avenues. The manager hoped that this would build a buzz for the game and the team. An arena was planned for after the war.

The outcome—a last place finish with a 16-29-3 record and a roster depleted by the war—forced the league to suspend the team. The NHL door was left ajar for a revived Americans team, but this never developed. An arena was not built in Brooklyn. The Ice Palace building was rented to a scenery-design company. Today, the site, a mile from the Barclays Center, is a parking lot.

Since that time, a lot has happened. After all these years, NHL hockey finally will settle in Brooklyn. Though the Islanders, similar to the Amerks, once had a shady owner, this deal to keep the team on Long Island involved an owner who knows how to run a business.

Sometimes old ideas are worth revisiting. With new information and a change in conditions, a tweak of an old idea can result in a win-win situation for investors and owners, the economy and all the others who benefit from good and timely business decisions.

With this move, the expectation is that the Islanders will attract better players to a state-of-the-art arena located close to Manhattan, and that the team will win many more games each season and play deep into the playoffs. The Islanders might again compete for the Stanley Cup, the value of the franchise will rise and the NHL will not need to move or fold another franchise.

Only fans of the Rangers might not like this outcome.

Jim

So much has occurred during the last handful of months that the 2012 Summer Olympics already is a distant memory.

The other day, while reading an article about a former Olympian, I decided to take a few moments to think about the countless hours that many of us spent in front of the television just a few months ago. I quickly realized that I actually remembered little about the results. Fresh in my mind, though, was what we learned about our young athletes. Back then, and again now, I was energized by the hard work, the passion and the sacrifices that pushed these young men and women to this highest level of international sports competition.

During the London games, we were bombarded with all the media hype and coverage, Facebook postings, YouTube videos, blogs and countless tweets. Rarely surfacing through all this noise were the insightful comments made by our athletes. Here are just a few of the many that most of us missed. Their words showcase their drive, their commitment to succeed and their gratitude to the people who helped along the way.

• Kerri Walsh (beach volleyball): “In fifth grade, volleyball was the new sport at my junior high school, and all my best friends were playing. From the first second, I loved it. And I’m thankful I’ve had amazing coaches and parents who were super enthused, right from the start.”
• Casey Tibbs (paralympic track and field and first amputee to serve as an air crewman in the U.S. Navy): “I lost my leg in 2001. About a year later, in a doctor’s waiting room, I ran across an article about the paralympic games. By the time I finished reading it, I knew this was something I wanted to do. I went to the gym that night and started working out.”
• Rebecca Soni (swimming and three-time medalist at the 2008 Olympic Games): “I actually started in gymnastics but switched to swimming when I was 10, because that’s what my older sister was doing. I had a choice. Either wait for my sister’s swimming class to end, or start swimming myself. I chose to swim.”
• Michael Landers (table tennis and youngest U.S. Men’s Singles Champion): “When I was nine, I broke my arm, which ruled out most other sports. But I’d been playing table with my dad since I was two. We found a table tennis club in Queens (New York City), and I started really focusing when I was 12. The great thing is, it’s still fun to me.”

As you can see from these comments, never underestimate the spark that ignites that passion in sports, or even in business. You will be influenced by parents, other relatives and friends, mentors and those you meet briefly along the way. Each encounter will lead you along your path to success, while competition and hard work will help you rack-up positive results. In some instances, you might just get to grab that gold.

Jim

Do you remember John Doherty? He pitched for the Detroit Tigers and Boston Red Sox from 1992 to 1996. A knee injury ended his professional career, but the baseball in his blood continues to find him on the diamond.

During one day this past summer, he offered his skills and patience to a group of developmentally disabled young adults from the Cardinal McCloskey Services program in Westchester County. Along with his old Eastchester High School coach, Dom Cecere, Doherty loaded bats, balls and hitting tees into a car and drove to a field to meet an enthusiastic group of young players.

The morning was dedicated to a skill session that included basic drills. Doherty and Cecere ran the clinic the same way for this special needs group as they would have organized it for regular little leaguers.

Doherty grew up in the shadows of the old Yankee Stadium before his family moved to Westchester. He enjoyed many years of success on the ball field right up to the major leagues, and his generosity was a big part of his game.

When Doherty was with the Tigers, his manager (Sparky Anderson) sent him to speak at a Drug Abuse Resistance Education program. That may have been when the baseball and public service connection started for Doherty.

Since that time, Doherty has participated on boards of many organizations, including the Eastchester School Foundation and the Major League Baseball Players Alumni Association. He has been a Muscular Dystrophy Association Muscle Team member and he has been involved with Miracle League baseball, which engages children and adults with severe disabilities.

After meeting Doherty, the people at McCloskey consider him a real professional, and not just as a baseball player. Possibly everything he learned about life started on the ball field. Now, that experience has taken him so much farther and it has touched many along the way.

Jim

Many stories of hard work, sacrifice, joy and tears flowed from the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Some of the young faces will be seen again for another and maybe several more Olympics, while others, especially those who did not stand on the winners’ podiums, will recede to the background and fade from memory.

What becomes of them? One story you may not have heard about involves a 48-year-old gymnast from Great Britain who now wears a clown suit.

Terry Bartlett competed in three Olympic Games. He performed on all the gymnastic apparatus but never won a medal. Today, and for the last 20 years, he has performed with a red nose and floppy shoes 10 times a week in a Las Vegas Cirque du Soleil show.

Cirque has hired many former Olympians over the years. They have defined talents that allow them to leap, tumble, flip and swing, and occasionally sing and dance when needed. They bring a level of skill and work ethic that is central to Cirque’s productions.

Bartlett has been in his post-Olympics career for 20 years now. He started when he was 28 after the 1992 games. Two of his teammates became teachers and another two joined the military. He decided to take what he learned for most of his life and turn it into a professional career. He probably had second thoughts at his audition when the casting director asked him to make monkey noises.

Not every Olympian sticks with the circus show. But for those who do, salaries range from $50,000 to hundreds of thousands for people with special talents.

For Bartlett and the many others who have made the leap from Olympians to Cirque performers, the conversion does have unique challenges. They include classes for acting, dancing, voice work and improvisation.

Maybe not what an Olympic athlete had in mind during all those youthful years of training. But, the hard work, sacrifice, joy and, yes, the tears, did pay off. For some, it did not include a medal. But for most, it did lead to a good living.

Jim

Roger Clemens has put together quite the resume over his 24-year Major League Baseball career.  A two time world champion, he received seven Cy Young awards and he currently ranks third on MLB’s all-time strikeout list.  After the 2007 season, the then 45-year-old Clemens finally decided to hang up his uniform to spend more time with his family.

But he couldn’t remain idle.  As with many athletes, Clemens is “married” to the game.  It is who he is as a person.  No matter the level of competition, professional or a pick-up league, athletes such as Clemens just have the game in their blood.

Clemens now is 50 years old, and he decided that he had enough of “retirement.” Agreeing to a one-year contract with the Sugar Land Skeeters of the independent Atlantic League, the “Rocket” recently made a comeback.  In his first start during August, Clemens didn’t allow a run while pitching three and one-third innings.  The most impressive stat was, at Clemens’ age,that he was able to reach 87 MPH on the radar gun.

It is clear Clemens did not come back to the game for the money or the publicity. Neither is found in an independent league. Clemens decided to come back for the passion of the game.  This is his “profession.”  It is what he loves to do.  He felt that he could still compete, and he wanted to try at least one more time.

It never is too late for anyone to get back into his or her game. Whether your career path was sports or business, if the work always had been enjoyable to you, then, with a few adjustments, you can make a comeback and again find satisfaction and success.

You are never too old to compete, even when your skills are out-of-date or a bit rusty. You just may need to reinvent yourself. That is what I did with my passion for lacrosse. While I have been very successful in business for more than 30 years after playing lacrosse in high school and college, a few years ago I decided that I missed the game of my youth. Since then, I have worked with and supported today’s athletes through programs at my alma maters of Hofstra and Half Hollow Hills High School East in Dix Hills.

If you have retained the passion for what you once did, and if the flame of desire keeps burning inside you, there always is the opportunity for you to find a way to remain in the game.

Jim

A small college in Illinois is making a big statement on the football field – with the football field.

This season will be the first year of football at Lindenwood University-Belleville. We don’t know yet how competitive the team will be, but the school wants to make the inaugural year a memorable one – the university had an original field designed to incorporate the school’s colors in a striped maroon and gray design.

This isn’t the first color-schemed field. Boise State had a blue field and Eastern Washington had one that was all red. Stripes also are not new (Central Arkansas). But, according to one sportswriter, this field will be unique – it will have the appearance of a flattened barbershop pole.

The Illinois school’s field is part of a $2.3 million stadium renovation that includes a new press box and new seating. The LU-Belleville Lynx will play its inaugural season in the NAIA (National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics) with a schedule that includes Kentucky Wesleyan, Oklahoma Panhandle State University, University of Saint Francis, Valley City State University and Central Methodist University.

These games between first-year LU-Belleville and its opponents won’t create any kind of national buzz about Lynx football. But, with the playing surface already a hot conversation within the sports world, the striped design could generate a significant amount of regional attention. The new field will provide the Lynx with the opportunity to showcase its football program, and the publicity just may attract student-athletes and local sponsors to help grow the program.

Standing out from the crowd, in a positive way, always is good for branding and business. But this visual will work only for a short time. Customers, and fans, quickly will want to see positive results. As with any business, the LU-Belleville Lynx must make sure that its first-year football program plays on a solid foundation, no matter the color, and that it remains focused on building for future success.

Jim