Good morning, class. Today’s topic is about the revolutionizing of professionalism within athletics, and by professionalism I’m referring to the psychological advantages that many athletes use to motivate them.

So much has changed in terms of what has embodied sports in this day and age, but so much hasn’t. There was once a time when athletes and teams put forth 100 percent no matter the circumstances, but now we have reached a point where an athlete has come to thrive on potential downfalls or criticism to determine what actually motivates them to do well.

This kind of philosophy has been exuded by our sports icons and permeated younger athletes. Of course, we shouldn’t expect a kid involved in little league competition, or even a kid in junior high sports, to perform on a game to game basis solely on what someone said about the performance or what the kid did or did not do in the previous game.

Maybe today’s professional, collegiate, and high school athletes should try to exemplify the approach of a seventh or eighth grader, and that is to consistently perform for the love of the sport rather then to allow the fact that no one believes in your ability or that you lost a game to inspire you.

We have been able to see this first hand throughout the course of this semester. The first instance that comes to mind is the day when the announcement came that four sports would be eliminated. Surely, a number of athletes felt a sense of urgency, like they had to prove something. One athlete even said their team was going to win the conference championship after he heard the news.

Immediately, my first impression was that anger prompted him to make such a bold statement. However, it wasn?t the fact that he showed that much confidence in himself and his teammates, but the fact that it came after the announcement.

Just a few weeks ago, Brandon Hicks, who was an instrumental part of the BG football team’s 8-3 record last season and was projected to be anywhere from a fourth to seventh round pick went undrafted. A day after the conclusion of the draft, he was signed as a free agent by the Indianapolis Colts, and when interviewed, his comments were that had something to prove as a result of going undrafted.

I could sympathize with his frustration, but I firmly believed that whether he was the No. 1 pick or drafted in the last round, the pressure to excel wouldn’t have changed one bit.

That said, I understand the mental toughness it takes to compete at certain levels of athletics, and it may be that many teams and individual athletes can only perform when their backs are against the wall or when they have been slighted in a certain situation.

For an athlete and even as a person who only deals with the trials and tribulations that life sometimes takes us through, it’s only normal to find something motivating to give yourself a mental edge and feel that there is something you need to prove to those who doubt whether you could make it through whatever was stopping your progress.

Quite honestly, the stigma that surrounds athletes when they have to bounce back from a disappointing loss or when they feel there is something to prove astonishes me because of the self-motivation that this person or team has, which also shows me that nothing will stop them from achieving their goal. But in hindsight, is it self-motivation if it is provided by others?

The fact of the matter is that we all love the underdog for one reason or another, but should athletes who is only inspired when they are against all odds be considered dedicated athletes? Furthermore, when athletes reiterate the point that they have something to prove, who are they referring to? We may never understand the answers or even find them, though one thing can hold true. And that is I believe that you have nothing to prove to anyone but yourselves.