Philosophy of sport... probably a class at some state school

I'd like some perspectives on this, so please do comment if you have the desire to do so.

I was party to a discussion this evening about goals and goal-setting. Members of IUs team who were in attendance were mad that others on the team didn't think the team could make it to Nationals this year.

In fact, one side of this argument was saying that your goal should be Nationals, every year. They disparaged those on the team who said that Nationals was out of reach for our team this year (or any year). When asked, I did not come down on that side of the argument.

It's an interesting discussion. I can see both sides, and as much as I was driving home tonight wanting to come down hard on one side or the other, I can't definitively swing the sledgehammer of fallacy on the other side of that argument.

I definitely lean towards setting attainable goals, though. I think that a lot of people want to make themselves out to be badasses, trying to seem like tough guys around others by setting an absurdly high bar for themselves. Honestly, if shooting for Nationals every year makes you work harder, then by all means make that your goal. I just don't think it's appropriate to criticize others for being sceptical about the chances and wanting to set more attainable goals.

When I came here, I was 90% sure that I would not be going to Nationals again. I knew that from the first tournament, when a bunch of our starting players toked up behind a fence during our bye round. Does that mean I didn't give 100% at every tournament? Does that mean I didn't spend a whole shitload of my free time in the weight room or taking the time to prepare healthy food? I challenge anyone to contradict me on those points.

On the other hand, everyone should be constantly striving to be the best they can be. I think that's a basic aspect of athletes and competitors in general. Otherwise, why compete? Most of the people who read this blog know me pretty well, and know that I'm pretty competitive about basically everything. At the same time, I don't think I can come down on the side of "Everyone should be striving for Nationals every year." I will admit, though, that I have a hard time directly answering the question of "Why not?"

In the case of IU specifically, I don't see how people can set Nationals as a reasonable goal after barely making it out of Sectionals last year. I think first and foremost, IU should be worried about making it out of Sectionals. Believe me, I know what happens when you start to look past Sectionals...

Furthermore, IU has two (2) established handlers. I look back on the old g-dub teams that made it to the games-to-go and we had handler lines that were four, five, six handlers deep. Sophomore year -- Ben, Bert, Tufsky, Timmy, Snaus. Junior year -- Tufsky, Lasky, DJ, Shed, Lyle, Pete. (Sorry if I missed anyone, I really have to get to this translation...)

The point is, g-dub was an extremely deep team with a lot of people who had Regionals-level and Nationals-level experience. We also never finished lower than fourth in our region while we were there. In contrast, for a team that finished 15th of 16 at Regionals last year, going to Nationals is 100% not a reasonable goal. Beyond that, I think it's completely fallacious to assume that just because someone doesn't think the Mama?s can make it to Nationals, they won't be trying their best every time they step on the field. That is simply absurd.

I guess really the only logical argument against the strive-for-Natties argument is that an unattainable goal is pretty much useless. Even that argument, though, mostly ends there.

What can those of you who still read my blog add to that? I'm interested to hear some arguments, because it's hard for me to directly address the comments my friends were making.