Teamwork: A Commitment to the Oneness
By Ken Reed
From a spiritual perspective, I don’t think there’s anything more beautiful to watch in sports than a team seamlessly working together as a group.
I once saw it described as a “commitment to the Oneness.” I like that.
Helping a teammate — and in doing so, helping yourself and the team as a whole — is communitarianism at its best. It’s a collective commitment to the common good.
There’s a reason that former athletes almost universally cherish their team accomplishments more than any individual achievements they might have had during their careers.
They miss the connection of being part of something bigger than themselves. This collective commitment to the whole creates a powerful bond, whether the ultimate team goal is achieved or not.
“The best teams have chemistry,” said New York Knicks legend Dave DeBusschere, who played on two NBA championship teams with the Knicks. “They communicate with each other and they sacrifice personal glory for the common goal.”
Basketball might be the best example of balancing individual freedom and the responsibility of helping the group. As a player, sometimes the best thing you can do for the team is to use your individual one-on-one skills to score a basket. At other times, passing to an open player, or helping a teammate on defense, are the most important contributions you can make toward the common good.
Given that balance, it makes sense that basketball was invented in America, at a little YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts. American society, like a basketball team, works best when individual freedom and the common good are effectively balanced.
“What are the American ideals?” Supreme Court Justice Louis D. Brandeis once asked. “They are the development of the individual for his own and the common good; the development of the individual through liberty; and the attainment of the common good through democracy and social justice.”
But basketball isn’t the only sport in which teamwork is critical, nor is its importance restricted to team sports played in the United States. Virtually all championship teams, from whatever country, exhibit a “commitment to the Oneness,” even if the personalities involved don’t always get along. For example, the Oakland A’s of the early 1970’s are remembered as much for the fighting amongst themselves as their three straight World Series championships. However, on the field they were a well-oiled, integrated unit because they knew that’s how they could achieve their goal.
Certainly, any team wants individual players to improve and play well, but the common good of the team has to take precedence if the ultimate goal, a championship, is to be achieved. This usually requires individual stars to make personal sacrifices in terms of statistics in order for the team to perform best as a unit.
However, the individual still benefits by the team’s success and is rewarded in multiple ways. Back to DeBusschere and his 1970 Knicks teammates Bill Bradley, Dick Barnett, Willis Reed and Walt Frazier. All were good players but none of them were considered the best individual players at their positions in the NBA. Yet, they all benefitted (economically and otherwise) as members of a cohesive championship team in ways they wouldn’t have as superstars on losing teams. Nearly 50 years later, every living player from that team is still treated as a hero in New York.
“Helping someone be the best they can be helps yourself,” says Bradley, who became a United States Senator following his playing days with the Knicks. He said the lessons he learned with the Knicks – the importance of teamwork and giving up some individualism for the common good – informed his public service efforts.
Here’s the cool thing: People respond positively to selflessness. They begin to act more selflessly themselves. The common good becomes more important to them. That’s why when the best player on a team is also the most unselfish player on a team, the chances of success for that team increase significantly.
It’s the Golden Rule at its best.
Selfishness and out-of-control egos destroy more teams with the potential to be great than anything else, including injuries.
On the other hand, teams that are truly “committed to the Oneness” are a rarity. But when they come together great things can happen. The recently crowned World Champions, the Boston Red Sox, are an example.
After the Red Sox dominated the MLB playoffs and won the World Series, Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey raved about how the team’s players put aside their egos and committed to a team-first mentality.
“This is an awesome team,” Healey said. “It’s all about teamwork, resilience and grit. This championship is about teamwork. That’s what we need in this world.”
Yes indeed.
— Ken Reed, Sports Policy Director, League of Fans
Sports Forum Podcast
Episode #29 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: The Honorable Tom McMillen Visits League of Fans’ Sports Forum – McMillen is a former All-American basketball player, Olympian, Rhodes Scholar and U.S. Congressman, and has a long involvement with the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sport (now called the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition). We discuss the state of college athletics today, given the pressures of NIL, the transfer portal, sports gambling and huge media contracts. McMillen then provides great perspective on the poor state of physical fitness our young people are experiencing today.
Listen on Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Anchor and others.
Follow on Facebook: @SportsForumPodcast
More Episodes on Apple Podcasts; Spotify; Google Podcasts; PocketCasts; & Anchor
Episode #28 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: A Chat With Mano Watsa, a Leading Basketball and Life Educator – Watsa is President of PGC Basketball, the largest education basketball camp in the world. We discuss problems in youth sports today.
Episode #27 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: Kids’ Sports: How We Can Take Back the Game and Restore Quality Family Time In the Process – Linda Flanagan is author of “Take Back the Game: How Money and Mania Are Ruining Kids’ Sports and Why It Matters.” We discuss how commercialized and professionalized youth sports are hurting kids and their families.
Episode #26 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: How Can We Fix Youth Sports? – John O’Sullivan is Founder and CEO of Changing the Game Project and author of “Changing the Game: The Parents Guide to Raising Happy, High Performing Athletes and Giving Youth Sports Back to Our Kids.”
Episode #25 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: Physical Education Should Be a Critical Component of K-12 School Design – Michael Horn is co-founder of the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation.
Episode #24 – League of Fans’ Sports Forum podcast: Mental Health and Athletes: Ending the Stigma – Nathan Braaten and Taylor Ricci are the founders of Dam Worth It, a non-profit created to end the stigma around mental health at colleges and universities through sport, storytelling, and community creation.
Media
"How We Can Save Sports" author Ken Reed appears on Fox & Friends to explain how there's "too much adult in youth sports."
Ken Reed appears on Mornings with Gail from KFKA Radio in Colorado to discuss bad parenting in youth athletics.
“Should College Athletes Be Paid?” Ken Reed on The Morning Show from Wisconsin Public Radio
Ken Reed appears on KGNU Community Radio in Colorado (at 02:30) to discuss equality in sports and Title IX.
Ken Reed appears on the Ralph Nader Radio Hour (at 38:35) to discuss his book The Sports Reformers: Working to Make the World of Sports a Better Place, and to talk about some current sports issues.
- Reed Appears on Ralph Nader Radio Hour League of Fans’ sports policy director, Ken Reed, Ralph Nader and the New York Times’ Tyler Kepner discussed a variety of sports issues on Nader’s radio show as well as Reed’s updated book, How We Can Save Sports: A Game Plan. Reed's book was released in paperback in February, and has a new introduction and several updated sections.
League of Fans is a sports reform project founded by Ralph Nader to fight for the higher principles of justice, fair play, equal opportunity and civil rights in sports; and to encourage safety and civic responsibility in sports industry and culture.
Vanderbilt Sport & Society - On The Ball with Andrew Maraniss with guest Ken Reed, Sports Policy Director for League of Fans and author of How We Can Save Sports: A Game Plan
Sports & Torts – Ken Reed, Sports Policy Director, League of Fans – at the American Museum of Tort Law
Books