Truckload Authority - April/May 2019

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“In my business life, in my home life, even my marriage — a lot of things — fundamentally, how I make decisions, I learned in the ‘Truth Laboratory’ on the field.” That’s why, even as Young was playing for a perennial Super Bowl contender, he put in a semester at law school every offseason. It’s easy now to forget that for the first several years of his career, it appeared the only way Young would get into the Hall of Fame would be to buy a ticket. He spent two seasons in the United States Football League before that league folded, then played two less-than-stellar years in Tampa Bay before coming over to the 49ers, where he wound up being relegated to Joe Montana’s backup for four seasons. The trade that brought him to San Francisco has since been hailed as one of the greatest steals in National Football League history. But as a backup, he became very discouraged at times, he said. And with a solid Plan B for his life, he sometimes thought about giving up on football. But it’s a funny thing, he said, “Having some alternatives was probably helpful.” Knowing he had a backup plan gave him peace of mind. He never felt anxiety about what he would do if football didn’t work out, which ultimately helped him stay positive and focus on the game, and stick it out until his opportunity came. Pass the ball, not the buck Backstage, the last football was signed with just enough time for Young to get fitted with his microphone. A minute later, he was onstage. He opened with a brief account of playing youth football and how his mother had to be restrained from retaliating whenever an opposing player hit her baby. From there, Young segued into his premise of the gridiron as the Truth Laboratory, with its instruments — the lines, the clock, the score, and one more element he hadn’t mentioned earlier that puts one’s character to the test. “Have you ever done something wrong, and 80,000 people surrounding you booed?” Young asked the audience. “It’s awful.” But that’s how the “Truth Laboratory” works. “At the end of that game you can’t say, ‘Oh, by the way, I didn’t throw that interception. That wasn’t me.’” People talk about what it takes to be a successful quarterback, Young said. Of course, it takes natural athleticism. It takes a strong, accurate arm and the ability to make smart, split-second decisions. But what sets apart the great quarterbacks from the rest? Football is a complicated game, Young said. On every play, 11 guys have to be on the same page. “And that’s the art of quarterbacking, if you think about it. All the great quarterbacks are great leaders of other humans. The best ones are always the guys who figure out week to week how to gather their teammates. The most important thing they do is to get people to play hard for them.” Take Tom Brady, Young said. Brady is about as successful a quarterback as there’s ever been. But look at Brady today. He’s 42 years old. Some of his teammates are half his age. He makes way more money than they do, and he’s married to a supermodel. There’s very little about Brady that his teammates can relate to personally, “but somehow Brady gets them to play hard for him,” Young said. What’s his secret? The next time you see Tom Brady giving an interview, Young said, ask yourself, “Who’s he really talking to?” It isn’t the reporter, it isn’t the fans. “Every word is laserfocused on his teammates,” Young said, because he knows it’s his character that dictates his ability to lead. Character comes out in the face of sudden disaster, Young said. In the Truth Laboratory of the football field, throwing a critical interception is such a disaster. “You’re down by four, you’re driving down the field to win the game,” Young said, setting the scene. “You can feel the momentum, you can feel the emotion. You can feel the sense of inevitability. It’s going to happen — and then you throw it to the other team.” At that moment, Young said, “You can feel the air go out of the building. A little voice inside asks, ‘How could I have done that? How obvious is it not to throw to the big, huge, dumb defender standing there?’” All your teammates turn to you, he said, and the looks on their faces are asking the same questions. There are a couple of ways you can react, Young said. “You could run, just get in the car and say, ‘I’m done.’” But that’s not likely. The next instinct would be to blame everyone and everything else: “You, receiver, you were supposed to turn out, but you turned in. And tackle, you were supposed to block that guy, and he hit me just as I was going to throw the ball. And look, the sun was in my eyes. And the ball is all wet and muddy because it was raining a minute ago.” The record books show Young threw 107 regular-season interceptions in the NFL. He said it took several errant tosses before he realized trying to rationalize and spread the blame did more harm than good. 26 TRUCKLOAD AUTHORITY | www.Truckload.org TCA 2019
The next time he threw a critical interception and all his teammates were looking at him, he simply said: “Look guys, the ball was in my hands, now it’s in their hands. I’m responsible. But here’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to go to the sidelines. We’re going to get a drink of water. We’re going to go back on the field and we’re going to win the game.” “What happened next tells you something about human beings,” he said. When they got off the field, the coach asked what happened, and immediately Young’s teammates started explaining everything they’d done wrong. What Young had realized was in that moment, his teammates weren’t looking for an explanation, they were looking for accountability. And when he took responsibility, they took their share, too. “It’s the same in any business. I can promise you, find those moments when the lights are on you, those key moments when somebody needs to stand up and say, ‘I’m responsible.’ What it does is it infuses the whole system with accountability.” The genius of generosity Young was brought to the 49ers in 1987 by head coach Bill Walsh. The 49ers were already well into what would eventually be a streak of 17 seasons in which they would make the playoffs, winning five Super Bowls along the way. Walsh was the architect of that team, and most other teams were trying to emulate his version of the West Coast Offense. When Young got to the 49ers, he noticed a man with a video camera would follow Walsh around all day, recording him. “I remember thinking, ‘Gee, this is weird,’” Young said. “‘I know he’s famous. I know he’s kind of known as the genius of coaching (Walsh’s actual nickname around the league was “The Genius”), but this is strange that they’d be taping everything he did. What does he think, that he’s like Patton or Abraham Lincoln or something?’” Young later came to understand that Walsh knew his methods were ahead of their time, and he was putting together a repository of those methods that could be used like a toolkit. Whenever one of his assistants would get their big chance to be a head coach somewhere, he would present them with his toolkit, wish them success, and tell them he looked forward to playing them for the championship. “Who does that?” Young asked the crowd. Who, when they’re at the peak of their career and they know it’s because they are doing things no one else does, just gives away all his secrets to men he knows will be his future opponents? Walsh looked at the world with a spirit of abundance, Young said. That may have been one of his most valuable tools, and it’s one that’s in short supply today. “I can promise you, find those moments when the lights are on you, those key moments when somebody needs to stand up and say, ‘I’m responsible.’ What it does is it infuses the whole system with accountability.” Make Every Minute Count. WEIGH. PAY. GET GOING. Would you like to add more time back into your drivers’ day? The Weigh My Truck app will help your drivers do just that. It is the fastest way to weigh. Weigh and pay all from a mobile device without leaving the cab, so your drivers can get back on the road faster. Same guaranteed accurate weights, just faster. Find out more: 1-877-CAT-SCALE (228-7225) catscale.com weighmytruck.com Now accepting: www.Truckload.org | TRUCKLOAD AUTHORITY 27
Page 1 and 2: CONVENTION COVERAGE | PAST CHAIRMEN
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Page 25: Hall of Famer Steve Young shares li
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