The Miami Dolphins were the most inept team in the National Football League in 2007, winning but a single game.
As of this morning, they have completed the greatest single-season turnaround in NFL history, by winning 11 games and capturing the AFC Eastern Division title.
Besides being a lifelong fan of the Dolphins, I find a tremendous amount of inspiration from this team, which has accomplished what was unimaginable just three months ago. If the Dolphins can buck the odds, can we not, as individual Realtors, buck the long odds and dire economic predictions everyone seems to have for 2009?
You see, not only were the Dolphins far and away the worst team in the NFL in 2007, they started the 2008 campaign in miserable fashion. They lost a close game to the NY Jets in Week One, and then were blown out by the Arizona Cardinals in Week Two. A lot of fans, myself included, were thinking, "Here we go again."
Then, EVERYTHING CHANGED. After the flight from Arizona landed in South Florida early that Monday morning, Coach Tony Sparano did not got home. Tony Sparano went to work.
In what could go down as an epic moment in the history of this franchise, Sparano went back to his office early that morning, and reviewed the Arizona game film three times. From this early morning film session came the "WILDCAT," an unconventional football formation which the Dolphins would utilize to turn their season around, starting the next week with a 38-13 rout of the mighty New England Patriots.
"The only way I know how to make it better is to go harder," Sparano said after the Arizona game. "So that's what we're going to do as a team. We're going to go harder. I'm going to go harder. I told the team (Sunday) night and I'll say it again, it ain't going to be this way forever."
Three months after deciding he would go to work instead of going to bed, Tony Sparano got a well-deserved Gatorade bath Sunday evening, after the Dolphins beat their old nemesis, the New York Jets, to clinch their first playoff berth since 2001.
We can't control the whole real estate market, but don't have control over our own destinies? Can't we go harder?
As the curtain is drawn on 2008, let's look to 2009 and see if we can't find a little Tony Sparano ( maybe even a little WILDCAT) in ourselves.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!
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