As anyone who knows me will tell you, I am not a sports fan. At all.
But this year my husband is playing Fantasy Football. So, we spent an entire Saturday watching college football games between schools we normally couldn’t care less about. Between us, we have three degrees from Georgia Tech. In the interest of winning a bet, he spent an hour rooting for our arch rival, the University of Georgia. This is very odd.
But I digress…
The good news is this gave me an opportunity to watch a guy named Tate Forcier. Forcier is a true freshman quarterback who plays for Michigan. I learned that a “true” freshman football player is someone who is actually in his first year of college versus someone who is called a freshman even though he is not. And you wonder why I don’t like sports.
But I digress again…
The point is, this kid just reached the age of 19 in August. It is only his second start in college. And, by most accounts, he kicked butt on Saturday. With his team trailing 31 to 34 with only two minutes left in the game, he led his team on a march down the field. Then with only 11 seconds remaining in the game, he completed a touchdown pass to secure a last second come from behind victory against Notre Dame. The interesting thing was, he looked completely calm out there. He never rushed. He never looked worried.
Regardless, a brilliant reporter asked him: “So, how nervous were you?”
Forcier’s answer: “I don’t get nervous. I always had plenty of time.”
And I believe him. Why? Because he obviously has what every aspiring quarterback wants to have. Great intuition and the guts to use it.
Have you ever actually counted the number of seconds a quarterback has to decide what to do with the ball? One second? Three seconds? There isn’t enough time for the quarterback to use analytical decision making tools like carefully identifying options, weighing pros and cons, and selecting the best option. Intuition is the only sense that can react quickly enough to make good decisions in this type of situation.
My guess is that this kid has really honed his ability to listen to what his intuition is telling him and then actually act on it without hesitation. He is obviously not the first or last player to do this, but it is still very cool.
More on football, the mind, and intuition in a future article…
Filed under: Intuition | Tagged: Football, Intuition, Tate Forcier
