Tuesday June 1, 2021; 10:17 AM EDT
There's a great scene in Bull Durham where the veteran teaches the rookie how to talk to reporters. It's all cliches. "Of course it's boring," says the pro, "that's the point." #- It's a ridiculous ritual. Esp with a star as young as Naomi Osaka. She has incredible talent, but when you're so young, in her case 23, most of it is intuitive, not well-understood. #
- I've seen that recently in interviews with Knicks star Derrick Rose. The questions reporters ask are still insipid, but at 32, having been a huge star at 22, youngest MVP ever, then having his body break over and over, he had to learn how it works, and now his play still has a lot of the spark he had when he was young, and even better, now he can tell you how he manages it, something he probably could not have done at 22. #
- I find at my advanced age, in a "sport" where you body's age doesn't matter (up to a point, see this blog in the summer of 2002), I have a much better understanding of how I do what I do than when I was an ambitious star in my 20s. I can tell you a lot more how this works than I could then, when I just had an intuitive sense of how it worked. Enough of that intuition was right so that I could make it to the next stage, and the one after that, and so on.#
- In software, very few people stick with it through their whole career as I have. Companies still have no idea how age and tech work co-relate. But we know a lot about tennis, and basketball. #
- Naomi Osaka is brilliant, wonderful, a joy to behold. You can see it, read it, in everything she does and says. Her intuition says she should be allowed to be introspective while she tries to win in her sport. Her intuition is incredibly compelling. I feel of her as I do of a great movie star or maker, or software developer. In 10 or 20 years ask her how she does it, she'll have some answers. Right now it's probably not possible. #
- My opinion only. #