The 'wrong' way to do 'right' things...

Recently, there have been two seemingly unrelated incidents in the sports world which deserve comment:

(And yes, here I am, not even a week after setting up a whole new site specifically for sports issues, discussing some events in the sports world. It's okay...this is about standards more than sports.)

Earlier this month, golfer Todd Miller withdrew from a golf tournament after making the finals because the final was scheduled to be played on a Sunday.

Just last week, Dolphin running back Ricky Williams retired from the NFL a week before training camp and a month before the start of the regular season.

What's the similarity? Both athletes have received criticism for their decisions--not as much for the actual decisions themselves, but for the timing.

Williams--had he made this decision at the end of the regular season last year--would then have allowed the Dolphins to plan ahead--signing a free agent running back during the offseason, or drafting one in April. Williams, in fact, had been a active participant in all of Miami's offseason workouts and meetings and had given no indication to anyone up until last week that there was even a possibility of him not playing this season.

Miller, similarly, had entered the tournament knowing that the final was on Sunday and had been a active participant in the tournament up until the end without mentioning to anyone nor giving any indication that there was a possibility that he wouldn't be participating in the final if he made it that far.

Again, the problem isn't the decisions themselves, but the timing. There's an art towards staying true to yourself while still being considerate of others--where you can make personal decisions but still be conscious of its effect on other people. Miller's decision may have been correct from a standards standpoint, but by (1) entering and participating and (2) not telling anyone ahead of time that he wasn't going to play in the final, he disrupted the entire tournament, including the officials and spectators who were expecting some actual golf on Sunday. This is akin to hiring a catering service for a party and waiting until that night when they show up and start to setup the food before telling them that you don't drink alcohol and are allergic to certain foods and could you please not serve them? Sure, you're the customer and it's your decision, but if you had told them ahead of time they wouldn't have prepared and brought the food and drinks over in the first place.

A couple of months ago, a faithful blog reader shared an experience where a girl went with him to see a movie and then at the movie theater told him the movie didn't meet her standards. It's her decision, of course, and keeping high standards for entertainment is good, but if the type of movie they were watching was so important to her, she should have brought it up earlier. Discussing it ahead of time would have given the guy a chance to change plans and do something else. Again, it's simple courtesy to be conscious of the time and trouble of other people while still staying true to your own standards. Williams could have allowed his team the chance to make other plans at running back when there were still free agents on the market. Miller appeared to think there was a chance that he could convince the tournament officials to change the final to Monday in the middle of the tournament, instead of petitioning them to change the final beforehand and then if unsuccessful, not playing at all. Compare that to what Miller actually did, and reading the quotes from other people in the article again, decide if his actions ended up impressing or annoying more people...