Life is… lifing.
Per usual, I’m trying to shove ten pounds of life into my five pound bag, and sometimes something drops.
I just saw a great instagram post about this, actually, from the tarmac, as I sat for hours on my delayed flight that I thought I so cleverly booked after the first delayed flight got cancelled. Lots of time for scrolling.
But, the post said this: the secret of life is not having too many balls in the air. It’s knowing which balls are glass and which are plastic.
Some glass balls didn’t fall this week, but some plastic ones did.
Anyway, on to our regularly scheduled programming…
What I Learned from the NFL Draft
This past weekend, the NFL held its annual draft — a whirlwind of scouting reports, televised predictions, flashy suits, inspiring stories, one unfortunate prank call, and big bets on raw talent.
And all I could think about? How often we get it wrong.
A couple of months ago, I had the honor of speaking to the Houston Texans and it got me thinking about what greatness really is.
How we see it.
How we grow it.
How we miss it.
And we do. We miss it all the time.
The Houston Texans took a chance on C.J. Stroud — overlooked in high school, late offer to Ohio State. Now? Playoff run. Offensive Rookie of the Year. Selected for the Pro Bowl. From not highly ranked to breaking NFL records.
But we don’t just miss greatness in football. We miss it in life. In leadership. In the people we manage, the talent we hire, the teammates we overlook, the potential we don’t know how to spot.
Because here’s the truth: We look for greatness in the obvious. We say, “I’ll know it when I see it…” but if you know it when you see it, that means you’ve seen it before, and if you only hire what you’ve seen before, you’ll be contained and constrained only to where you’ve been before.
Greatness doesn’t always look like what we expect.
It doesn’t always show up in the package we had in mind.
We’re surrounded by people capable of so much more than we recognize — but we miss them because we’re not really seeing them.
We’re not looking underneath.
We Overlook Talent…
Tom Brady was drafted 199th overall. Teams passed on him 198 times. Why? He wasn’t fast. He wasn’t built. He wasn’t flashy. What they didn’t see was the obsession. The work ethic. The mental toughness. They didn’t see the greatness. Until he gave them no choice.
Seven Super Bowl rings later, he’s the guy everyone wishes they hadn’t overlooked. The GOAT.
Jalen Hurts was benched in the middle of the national college championship game. Sat as the backup the next year. Transferred schools and questioned at every level.
He wasn’t a first-round pick. Drafted at #57, analysts weren’t sold.
But the Eagles took a shot.
Today, he’s a Super Bowl winning quarterback and a Super Bowl MVP.
Turns out, what looked like a “setback” was actually his setup.
And Kurt Warner? No NFL team wanted him. He went undrafted. He stocked shelves at a grocery store, played arena football, and also played in Europe. Then, finally, someone gave him a real shot in the NFL…as a backup. When the starting quarterback got hurt, he really got his shot as a starter in the NFL at 28 years old.
That season? He won NFL MVP. Super Bowl MVP. And led the Rams to a Super Bowl win.
He didn’t become great when he got the opportunity.
He was already great. He just hadn’t been seen.
These guys weren’t hidden. They were right there.
But they didn’t fit the mold. So they got missed.
…and We Miss Greatness
Here’s what I know to be true: We miss greatness when we look only for the obvious.
We reward polish instead of potential. We evaluate based on where someone’s been, instead of imagining where they might go.
But if we want to lead better — as managers, teammates, decision-makers, and humans — we have to change the lens.
We have to look deeper.
Because greatness isn’t always loud. It’s not always obvious. It’s often raw. Unfinished. Unshiny. Still becoming.
We miss it not because it’s hidden — but because we’re not looking.
As I dig into writing my next book, this is the heartbeat of it all.
The players.
The leaders.
The co-workers.
The kids.
The people right beside us who are capable of so much more than we see… if only we chose to really see them.
This week, I invite you to expand your vision. Not just to see people for who they are — but for who they might become.
The next Tom Brady might not look like a GOAT today.
The next Jalen Hurts might be quietly rebuilding confidence after a setback.
The next Kurt Warner might be bagging groceries and dreaming big.
Will you recognize them?
Or will you wait until everyone else sees it too?
P.S. This is Juniper. She’s not on the roster — just holding the football like someone who remembers the one thing the 49ers should’ve during last year’s Super Bowl: how to win at everything.
