Can you buy success?

What made Dirk Nowitzki
the Most Valuable Player?

You don’t have to care about sports to appreciate this.
An underdog team won this year’s NBA championship.
The gutsy Dallas Mavericks beat a bunch of all stars.
Everyone said they were over-matched from the start.
They were supposed to fold in the first round.

They battled through pro basketball's best teams.
Bookies probably lost a fortune betting against them.
Sunday night they beat the Miami Heat 105-95.
The Heat was not supposed to lose.

It was an emotional moment for Dallas’s Dirk Nowitzki.
He even hid in the locker room and cried.
He had been called a choke artist much of his career
Now he was the tournament's Most Valuable Player.

Miami had bought three top pro basketball stars.
Their aim was to win the NBA championship.
Everyone thought they would.
The Mavericks showed you can’t buy championships.
It takes a team, a dream and guts to do that.

So here’s the takeway from this little story:

1. Be careful that you don’t under-estimate rivals.
It isn’t the size of the dog in the fight.
It’s the size of the fight in the dog.

2. Never ever give in no matter what.
Winston Churchill rallied his countrymen at war.
They were a nation under seige by Nazi Germany.
“Never, never, never give in,” he told his people.
They didn’t and you know the rest of the story.

3. Believe in yourself no matter who opposes you.
Walt Disney’s people thought he had lost his mind.
He wanted to build a costly amusement park.
They begged and pleaded with Walt to forget it.
He didn’t. He rolled the dice and built Disneyland.
You know the rest of that story, too.

Please add your own story at Post a Comment below.
All of us love great underdog stories.