Dropping the Ball

by Eddie Pipkin

In my sports watching of the past week, there were heartbreaking moments of excellent players failing in spectacular fashion. The Yankees leaped out to a five-run lead in game four of the World Series as they fought to stave off elimination, then collapsed in a confounding series of errors that let the Dodgers back into the contest. Spoiler alert for you non-sports folks: the Yankees blew it; the Dodgers won the Series. Meanwhile, a New York Jets rookie wide receiver sabotaged his own first touchdown run with a celebration that involved letting the ball fall from his hands – a little too early it turned out. Sometimes we lose focus at the wrong time. We’re on a solid trajectory, but our attention wanders, and we veer off course. We don’t quite get the job done.

It’s an aphorism that’s been around as long as people have been competing against one another in games involving balls. (Here’s a discussion of the phrase and its usage on The Grammarist web site.) Other versions of the same sentiment include “taking your eye off the ball,” ‘fumbling,” “slipping up,” “messing up,” and additional iterations of failing:

“Drop the ball” is a pretty common idiomatic expression we use that means to fail in one’s responsibilities or duties, make a mistake, or simply let someone down. You’ll see it used in contexts where someone didn’t live up to the expectations of others or didn’t complete something the way they should have.

What really sets “drop/dropping the ball” apart as a phrase, though, is the implicit understanding that success was well in hand before the mistake was made. The ball was there! You were in position to catch the ball! You literally had the game in hand! You dropped the ball! How could you possibly drop the ball??? That’s a much different scenario than a player who is trying to make an improbable play and doesn’t quite pull it off. The implication is that the play was well within your abilities and skill set, and for whatever reason, you blew it.

Take, for example, the mistake by Jets player Malachi Corley, that I referenced earlier. Watch the clip for yourself by clicking this link. He had an amazing run; he had the touchdown in the bag; he got cute on the ball drop maneuver (which you’re supposed to do after you’re in the end zone); he dropped the ball too early, which is a fumble, which rolled all the way through the end zone, which is, by rule a touchback. For you non-football folks, that means not only did he not get the touchdown; the other team got the ball. Ouch.

That’s an unforced error.

He had one job at that point: to get into the end zone with the ball. Then he could celebrate in whatever crazy, creative way he could concoct. But he dropped the ball. In this case, it did not cost his team the game. They won anyway. But it might have.

How many times have we lost focus and dropped the ball right at a critical moment for ourselves or our team?

It’s all about discipline, and the secret of mental discipline is to be focused even when focus is at its most difficult because we are distracted or tired or looking beyond the final step to the celebration. There are some keys to maintaining focus, and if we use them, it is less likely we will find ourselves dropping the ball:

Have a written checklist.

Write the steps of your plan down in detail (which is also a good way to be sure you have a great plan). Work those steps one by one with intention, just like surgeons do. It’s tempting to skip a step or rush through steps, but it’s the things that are most routine that sometimes trip us up. Take the time to do each step correctly.

Practice, practice, practice.

If you routinely utilize a specific skill for your organization (preaching and teaching are great examples), don’t rely only on game day performance to get better. Study and practice. The original usage of “drop the ball” comes from baseball, which is a sport that relies on thousands of routine catches in each season. That is only possible because of all those practice balls professional players catch. They never stop practicing, no matter how good they become.

Have a coach.

A coach or any other version of an accountability partner is essential to keep us honest and humble as we do what we are gifted to do. Their insights can make us better; their attention can help us catch things we would otherwise miss. Two sets of eyes and ears are better than one, and by talking through the steps of the process with someone we trust, by having a partner in the process, we will always be at our sharpest.

Have an official plan for when the celebration can begin.

Do not declare victory prematurely. A great example of this is when local churches host a festival of some sort during which many community members registered contact information. The event has gone well, but then we neglect the step in which we utilize the contact information to reach out and build relationships. We get so excited about the good work we have done that we sabotage the ultimate goal of making connections with new people. Agree with your team exactly what a fully completed project will look like, and no celebrating until it’s accomplished!

Visualize the process.

Having written down the steps of your process, take every opportunity to think them through and mentally rehearse them, including with variations of things that might not go according to plan. This is a technique that professional athletes use when running a play or making a shot. They think it through, then they execute it.

Have a backup strategy.

Maybe you’ve done all the things on this list, and you’ve worked to keep your focus, but you still drop the ball. Have a strategy in mind for how to recover as quickly as possible. Don’t let the disruption derail your entire project. Keep moving forward with determination and a realistic Plan B.

Have you ever dropped the ball so dramatically that critical mistakes were made that derailed a project or endangered your personal progress? How did you recover? How do you guard against making that same kind of unforced error in the future? How do you help others avoid the same kind of mistake? Share your stories and your strategies in the comments section below. And hang on to the ball!