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September 28, 2008

Baseball, Startups and Always Wanting to Believe

Baseball continues to be amazing game. An ever forgiving game. And a game where anything can and will happen. Baseball is a game of inches. Baseball is a game of momentum. There will be days where your team wins and days where your team loses and how the team handles their wins and their loses will have an impact on their overall performance during the season.

The Mets 2008 baseball season just came to an end. A season which reinforced the concept that every game in a 162 game baseball season matters. Games count as much in April as in September. And just like in 2007, had the Mets figured out how to win 2 more games in 2008, they would have made it to the first round of the playoffs. And maybe if the Mets had better relief pitching, maybe their bullpen would not have lost as many games as they did this season.

On the positive side, the 2008 Mets gave me reasons to believe in them. And more reasons to love the game. Johan Santana’s performance just yesterday was absolutely amazing. For Santana to back from three days rest and pitch a complete game, 3 hit, 2-0 shutout was just great. And despite all their troubles in September, these 2008 Mets were still playing a significant game on September 28th with the chance to make it to the playoffs. How many other baseball teams wished they had such an opportunity? The answer, many.

Now, I’m not exactly sure what the connection is, but it seems that a number of my friends from the venture world are also dedicated baseball fans. I’m guessing it has something to do with the fact that as investors they believe in their startups and they share the belief that anything is possible. That the companies in their venture fund portfolios will be the winners in their respective spaces.

Based on my own startup history, being the CEO of a hi-tech startup can feel a lot like what a baseball fan imagines it is like being the manager of a major league baseball team. You always have to worry about what the owners (investors) have to say and how they react based on your teams recent performance. And sometimes they will be there to second guess your decisions.

So the pressure is always there. And like any good manager, we have to learn to cut our losses early, and how to balance our desire to embrace younger players, mentor them and guide them as they gain the experience that they will remember for the rest of their careers while doing what we need to win. And when needed, we make the moves we need to in order to secure our chances for a victory. The bottom line is that in both baseball and in our startups, we have a better chance to be successful when everyone on the team supports and respects each other and when everyone believes in the collective vision.

When things don’t work out the way we had hoped, I have also learned there is always a tomorrow. There is never any shortage of great new ideas. And by allowing ourselves to believe, we leave ourselves the opportunity to believe that our next season will be the one that takes us to a championship, and that our next startup’s exit will be the one with a multi-billion dollar valuation at the IPO.

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Posted by jeff on September 28, 2008 05:39 PM | Permalink

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Comments

Posted by: YAG laser marking machine at December 3, 2009 11:59 PM

Posted by: YAG laser marking machine at December 3, 2009 11:58 PM

Posted by: electric hoist at December 3, 2009 11:53 PM

Posted by: injection molding at June 23, 2009 11:00 PM

Great post Jeff,
i'm a true believer in regardless of how bad a project is/was as long as you can bounce back for another project then you are always ahead (even if not financially).

Cheers,
Dean

Posted by: dean collins at September 28, 2008 10:03 PM

Great blog post. It's so true. I've been launching ventures since college, and some go well, others not so much. But in the end we learn, and move on. Good baseball/team analogy here as with all ventures...

Posted by: Allen Klosowski at September 28, 2008 05:43 PM

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