I just finished listening to another great book from Michael Easter, “Scarcity Brain”. I enjoy listening to books that help us in everyday life, because that’s what everyone needs. You are never going to meet an athlete (or person) that has life completely figured out. They may think that they have it figured out, but you need to have an endless amount of information to help them when they figure out they don’t. This book helped me realize why I have some of the habits that I repeat daily. Fixing your habits has almost become a buzz statement because of another great book, “Atomic Habits” by James Clear. Habits are what make us who we are. We all have good habits and we all have bad habits. As a coach, you can lead by example and demonstrate good habits. You can be vulnerable and have your athletes open up to you by explaining what bad habits you have and how you work through them. I’ve talked about some of my habits in my previous blogs, but I want to take this chance to use the scarcity loop to discuss some of the hot button topics in college athletics. They don’t all fit perfectly into the loop but I hope you will see the connection.

Social Media Commitments

Opportunity→ Post your commitment/offer

Unpredictable Rewards→ Who will like,repost and comment on your commitment?

Quick Repeatability→ These post are seen daily of your peers

Michael talks about social media in the book and how it fits perfectly into the loop. He discusses how it hurt people in journalism, because they were writing what would be successful on twitter rather than tell the entire story. What we see in college baseball is that “the logo” means a lot in the process of committing to a school. This is not the fault of anyone, it’s human nature. We all want “the best”. If a recruit commits to LSU, he is going to get a ton of love on social media. If a recruit commits to a small unknown college, the love will not be the same on social media. How do you help a student-athlete make the “right” decision over the popular decision? I’ve been using quotes on “right”, “the best” and “the logo” because it’s all relative to who it pertains to. It is different for everyone. I think the best approach to making big decisions in life is to think lightly of yourself and deeply of the world. Be curious about everything that goes into choosing where you want to go to school for the next 2 or 4 years. This leads us directly into the next topic. 

Transfer Portal+NIL

Opportunity→ Transfer to a “better” school with possible financial gain.

Unpredictable rewards→ No idea what school will be an option or how much money you will get.

Quick repeatability→ Anyone and everyone is doing it. 

College athletics is in a time that is unlike anything that we’ve seen before. This is due to the combination of the transfer portal and NIL money. The combination of being able to transfer from D1 to D1 without having to sit out a year while making money has created an interesting landscape. Is this better for the game? There are many opinions out there on this. I’ll share mine. I believe that we should have installed the transfer portal OR NIL money. The combination of the two has led to the situation we are in. This is another situation where you cannot blame the kids. If you have an opportunity to leave your current institution for an opportunity that provides you with life changing opportunities, you are going to take it. Now is everyone using the transfer portal and NIL for life changing opportunities? No. It’s a gamble just like anything else in life. Is gambling always bad? No. Going through this process, you have to make sure you have the right people in your corner giving you advice and take your time deciding. 

These are not the best examples of the scarcity loop, but I’ve been wanting to write about these two issues. I saw this as a good opportunity to open the dialogue of these problems cohesively. I love this book and I also love his first book “Comfort Crisis”. The combination of these two issues have created disloyalty in one of the last genuine places that offered it: college. The Scarcity Loop is running rampant in many parts of life like Michael highlights in his book. It is my hope that we can do something about these recent changes in the college landscape to restore the culture of college athletics.