Quote:Luck has nothing to do with it.  Luck is preparedness + opportunity.

 

If it isn't working, then you aren't understanding why.  The why could very well be you're missing the players to execute.  You have to understand why it's failing in order to fix it, or change/create/modify/adapt to fit what you have until you do get the right ingredients.  You change the players to get the fit, or fit to the players.  Where you fail is where you're missing the pieces and unwilling to change them, or unwilling to change to best use your pieces.

 

Hubris is the most common reason for such failure.  If you aren't willing or simply fail to identify the problems, you can't possibly fix them.  

 

The Spurs and the Patriots are successful for a reason. To think that the people who Belichick and Popovich have groomed under them would not know the "why" goes against the very nature of why those teams are successful. 

 

To think that luck didn't play a role in those teams success is being naive. Had the Spurs not lost David Robinson for the entire year, they would not have been in the position to land Tim Duncan. And even after that, they made a jump in the NBA lottery to leap frog the Celtics who had much better odds to have the #1 pick that year. The Celtics, btw, ended up with Raef Lafrentz. There's no other possible way to "spin" that circumstance as having a bit of luck.

 

The Spurs could have prepared themselves as best as they could, but if Robinson doesn't get hurt, they go to the playoffs, don't end up with the #1 pick to get Duncan, there's absolutely no telling if they are the dynasty that they are now.

 

Same thing with the Patriots. Yes, they were one of only two teams to really scout Brady. But it still took every single team passing on him for 6 rounds before they drafted him. And what if Bledsoe didn't get hurt? Would Brady have gotten the chance to play and make the playoff run?

 

It takes everything top-to-bottom (ownership, management, coaching, players) to click for franchises like those two to emerge. And yes, that includes some luck too.

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