I'm not sure that an athlete is prepared to be a role model. He has a lot of attention paid to him that he shouldn't have, and then the athletes tend to think of themselves as better than they are.
Interpretation
Athletes may not be ready to handle the role of a role model due to the undue attention they receive.
Bobby Knight's quote reflects on the complexities of athlete celebrity and the expectations placed upon them as role models. He suggests that the extreme attention given to athletes can distort their self-perception, leading them to potentially overestimate their own significance and influence. This raises questions about the appropriateness of defining athletes as role models when their professional achievements may not necessarily correlate with character or moral leadership.
In practice
Use this quote in a discussion about athlete responsibilities in schools.
My dad was a very quiet person, and unbelievably tough. But my grandmother gave me my first look at negative thinking to bring about positive results. When I was just a little guy, anytime I came to my grandmother and said I wish for this or that, Grandma would say, 'If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.'
Your biggest opponent isn't the other guy. It's human nature.
People want national championship banners. People want to talk about Indiana being competitive. How do we get there? We don't get there with milk and cookies.
When we're playing a good scoring center, we tell our team that it is not our defensive man's job to stop the center. It's the responsibility of our perimeter people to stop the ball from going inside.
Failure, to me, is not having the desire to try. Having the desire to try is in it own way success.
A coach should never be afraid to ask questions of anyone he could learn from.
We want to support our troops because they didn't make the decision to go there... but I don't think it should be open-ended. We ought to have a benchmark where the administration has to come back and give us a report.
Power moves with you when you have an intent to serve more than yourself.
The really expert riders of horses let the horse know immediately who is in control, but then they guide the horse with loose reins and very seldom use the spurs. So it was with our chief [William Rehnquist]. He guided us with loose reins and used the spurs only rarely to get us up to speed with our work.
I had worked hard my entire career to establish myself as a leader. But I wasn't a leader until I was perceived as one.
There is a new model of leadership in the world that rides on the premise that every single person in the organisation can be a leader. Titles are important for structure and order, but real power does not come from titles.
Words have power. Use the language of leadership versus the vocabulary of a victim.
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