OT: Number one speech

No.1 Speech, by Vince Lombardi

"Winning is not a sometime thing; it's an all the time thing. You don't
win once in a while; you don't do things right once in a while; you do
them right all the time. Winning is a habit. Unfortunately, so is
losing.

"There is no room for second place. There is only one place in my game,
and that's first place. I have finished second twice in my time at Green
Bay, and I don't ever want to finish second again. There is a second
place bowl game, but it is a game for losers played by losers. It is and
always has been an American zeal to be first in anything we do, and to
win, and to win, and to win.

"Every time a football player goes to ply his trade he's got to play
from the ground up ‹ from the soles of his feet right up to his head.
Every inch of him has to play. Some guys play with their heads. That's
O.K. You've got to be smart to be number one in any business. But more
importantly, you've got to play with your heart, with every fiber of
your body. If you're lucky enough to find a guy with a lot of head and a
lot of heart, he's never going to come off the field second.

"Running a football team is no different than running any other kind of
organization ‹ an army, a political party or a business. The principles
are the same. The object is to win ‹ to beat the other guy. Maybe that
sounds hard or cruel. I don't think it is.

"It is a reality of life that men are competitive and the most
competitive games draw the most competitive men. That's why they are
there ‹ to compete. To know the rules and objectives when they get in
the game. The object is to win fairly, squarely, by the rules ‹ but to
win.

"And in truth, I've never known a man worth his salt who in the long
run, deep down in his heart, didn't appreciate the grind, the
discipline. There is something in good men that really yearns for
discipline and the harsh reality of head to head combat.

"I don't say these things because I believe in the "brute" nature of man
or that men must be brutalized to be combative. I believe in God, and I
believe in human decency. But I firmly believe that any man's finest
hour, the greatest fulfillment of all that he holds dear, is that moment
when he has worked his heart out in a good cause and lies exhausted on
the field of battle ‹ victorious."
--
"Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit."

Vince Lombardi