At age nine, I got a paper route. Sixty-six papers had to be delivered to sixty-six families every day. I also had to collect thirty cents a week from each customer. I owed the paper twenty cents per customer per week, and got to keep the rest. When I didn't collect, the balance came out of my profit. My average income was six dollars a week.
The freedom to do your own thing ends when you have obligations and responsibilities. If you want to fail yourself - you can - but you cannot do your own thing if you have responsibilities to team members.
After landing his invasion forces on the shores of some country, the sixteenth-century Spanish conquistador Hernan Cortes would immediately burn his own boats. He was sending his army a message: "We can't turn back. Either we succeed here or we die here." Excuses were not an option.
In golf, the player, coach and official are rolled into one, and they overlap completely. Golf really is the best microcosm of life - or at least the way life should be.
Coaching is about helping young people have a chance
to succeed. There is no more awesome responsibility
than that. One of the greatest honors a person can have
is being called 'Coach.'
An agent won't help you get drafted higher, won't make you win more games, and won't make you faster or stronger. They all say they can, but the people who do the drafting don't talk to agents. They talk to coaches, they watch film, they talk to the people who've worked with players. They don't talk to agents.