The Parable of the 86,400

I go back to my college baseball days and recall our team chaplain's profound reality check on a team loaded with Major League talent, but underperforming in what would become a legendary season

The year was 2005.  The Ole Miss Baseball Rebels were in the middle of what would turn out to be an excellent season, but the team was not living up to expectations at the midway point in the Southeastern Conference schedule.  Halfway through the league slate, immediately following a series loss in sweltering Baton Rouge, Louisiana, against LSU, the Rebels were in the middle of the pack in the SEC West with a 7-8 conference mark, though still nationally ranked.

I think that 2005 team was the most talented team the Rebels ever had, even though Mike Bianco’s 2022 squad won the National Championship against all odds, cutting through the postseason opposition like a hot knife through butter after a tumultuous regular season campaign.

Our 2005 team had a three-time All-American two-way player (pitcher and first baseman) named Stephen Head, a high school classmate and teammate of mine and an absolute bulldog on the mound and menace at the plate in the clutch:

We had Chris Coghlan, whose Major League career never took off due to injuries, although he won the 2009 National League Rookie of the Year Award and was part of the Cubs’ first World Series title in 108 years in 2016:

Zack Cozart, a nine-year Major Leaguer and 2017 All-Star from the Memphis area provided a great glove and strong bat up the middle at shortstop as a true freshman:

Our team was so deep, we had future big leaguers in the middle of the pitching rotation and rotating in as fourth outfielders, like Matt Maloney and Alex Presley:

Simply put, our team was loaded.  Our best offensive player that year, at least from a statistical vantage point, was a good old Southern boy named Brian Pettway, who had a brief minor league career after that season and came back home.  I was in my second year working with the Rebels as a student assistant, a volunteer role that helped me strengthen my critical thinking ability and a talent for developing unique ways to measure data and performance.  Working with the coaching staff to evaluate our own players and the opposition, the 2004-07 Rebels were a full decade ahead of the big push for analytics in college baseball.

Part of what makes the game the greatest of all American sports, in my humble opinion, is that the best team doesn’t always win.  That alone makes it worth watching.  One great pitcher, as our team found out the year before in our own Oxford Regional against the fourth-seeded Western Kentucky Hilltoppers, can stymie all nine bats and extinguish championship hopes in a span of three hours.  Our own great 2005 team got stopped a game short of the College World Series by the eventual National Champion, the University of Texas, which had its own big-league talent scattered through the roster.

That team was struggling to stay consistent in the early part of the season and seemingly struggling under the weight of such high expectations.  Enter Team Chaplain Wes Yeary, one of the greatest people I’ve ever known and a former college football player at Baylor University:

A strong believer in Christ and master motivator, Wes was serving out his last year as the Ole Miss Athletics chaplain.  He loved baseball season the most and was always on the bus, in the gym, in the dugout, and on the field and readily available for everyone, never failing to meet them exactly where they were.  In a world consumed by win at all costs, Wes never lost sight of the goal, to develop the athletes under his watch into authentic men.

We were somewhere in that second half of the conference schedule, which saw us get red hot and eventually tie for a share of the SEC West title, when Wes entered the home clubhouse on a Sunday morning prior to a conference series finale.  The conversation went something like this:

Coghlan, what would you do if I gave you 86,400?

I dunno, buy a car?

What about you, Osteen?  What if I gave you 86,400?

Throw the biggest party you’ve ever seen!

What about you, Gunz?

I feel like this is a trick question…

I see some of you thinking, your minds are racing – but guess what – you’ve all got an equal currency today.  86,400 seconds.

Every one of you sitting here today has 86,400 seconds, and so does every person out there.  How you spend your currency day by day amounts to what you make of your weeks, your months, and your years.  The work habits you develop today carry forward long after you hang up these uniforms and contribute to what type of man you become…

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I don’t remember if we went out and won that game, but we were nearly unstoppable from that point forward on the field.  We played in the SEC Tournament championship game, won the Oxford Regional, and as I mentioned earlier, were a big hit away from advancing to the College World Series.

A lot of what went into that surge was a byproduct of hard work being applied to an already impressive stockpile of talent.  More cuts in the cages, more focus in bullpen sessions, smarter baserunning decisions, opponent study, and commitment to physical conditioning all increased after the team got sick of underperforming and got serious about making the most of every one of the 86,400 seconds available to them daily.  Sometimes the players even wanted to watch video of their opponents playing ball on the bus rides rather than replay the same old movies.

Three for the Free

I.                             Time Management Matters

We also have the same currency available to us.  Think about how you spend your 86,400 every day, and I’ll bet you will find room for improvement.  The wealthiest people in the world are also bound to this same number, 86,400, and spend their fortunes seeking to give themselves more increments of 86,400 rather than maximizing those that are renewed daily.

II.                         Root Out Unproductive Time

You need to sleep for 7 or 8 hours per night to heal your body and maintain your brain function, and this time must be budgeted.  Limit idle video gaming and phone surfing time and replace it with physical fitness, writing, reading, or building, crafting, or creative work.  That will rewire your mind to seek productivity and make you a more capable and alert citizen.

III.                      Free Men Command their Time

Those who wish to dumb down society, such as those who run the world today, want you to aimlessly scroll on your phone, get pissed off, and be informed by them rather than seeking out the information yourself.  Even in circles frequented by free thinkers, I find a lot of groupthink and encourage people to research on their own.  They are often surprised by the results.

The choice is yours, and I recommend you take an inventory of just where your time is going. Self-teaching matters. Family matters. Fitness and real education matters. Your engagement in a world bent on self-ruin is something that must be budgeted out, or your 86,400 will dwindle accordingly.