As you know, I’m a baseball fan, and a New York Yankees fan. When I was young, we only got baseball on TV on Saturday afternoons (imagine that!). I lived in an area that did not have a major league team, so who was on TV?

The Yankees.

Later, I moved to New York for graduate school and lived the life of a “real” fan. Today, the owner of the Yankees, George Steinbrenner, died. It’s been really interesting to see the reaction and the old clips of him on TV.

He wasn’t liked by everyone. He was often mean, demanding, arrogant and perfectionist. He bought and traded players and hired and fired managers at will. He drove us fans crazy with his changes and tinkering, and he traded our favorite players away often.

He took a diminished Yankee team and re-invested them with pride and drove them towards victory again. The road was rocky and decidedly not pretty. That didn’t bother him.

The Yankees won seven World Series Championships under his stewardship. Together with the 20 won before he became owner in 1973, that is 27 World Series Championships, the most recent last year. No other sports franchise has won more than the Yankees.

Winning was paramount to Mr. Steinbrenner, as he was always addressed. He wanted to win more than anything. In fact, he said:

“The day I don’t want to win for New York, that’s the day I better get the hell out of the business.” – George Steinbrenner

and

“The only thing I want to do more than win is breathe.” – George Steinbrenner

When I think about Mr. Steinbrenner, there are two aspects to his legacy that stand out:

#1 He didn’t care what anyone thought of him. He didn’t apologize, deny, diminish, or smooth over his desire to win.

#2 He never stopped working towards his goal of winning.

What is so important to you that it comes right after breathing on the list of priorities?

What would happen if we all focused that intently on what we really want in life?

(Thank you, Mr. Steinbrenner)