Find a Way To Stand Out
March 22, 2025
"I needed to find a way to stand out," wrote George Raveling. The man responsible for bringing Michael Jordan to Nike and the success of the Jordan brand. Raveling, the man accredited for making or helping basketball become an international sport. Responsible for bringing Yao Ming to America, at the age of 18. Raveling had dinner with President Jimmy Carter and Harry S. Truman. He's met 5-6 presidents, oh, and he owns Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. "I have a Dream Speech.”
Before all that and becoming a mentor to so many, Raveling was struggling as a college basket player at Villanova. He was the only black player, back when schools were segregated. Even when Raveling was born, since he's black, he was born in the basement of the hospital while white babies had rooms upstairs. Raveling played on full scholarship, which was unheard of at the time, for a black athlete. He struggled to get playing time and so he needed to find a way to stand out. 'Nobody seemed to be a great rebounder " George Raveling wrote, in his new book, "WHAT YOU'RE MADE FOR: Powerful life lessons from my career in sports" See my signed copy below, co-written by Ryan Holiday.
In order to stand out George got creative. He created his own drills to practice rebounding the basketball. He spent time in the weight room training his lower body to be unmovable under or near the basket. He even watched film and studied the path the ball took when it left a players hand so he could position himself where the ball would end up. "If I get great at rebounding... there's no way they're not going to play a guy who secures more possessions for the team, raveling wrote. and it worked. Setting records in rebounding.
Finding an edge, a way to stand out, "is a strategy that works in any field; find something that's under-appreciated, not being addressed, or being overlooked, and get really good at it... if you become the foremost expert at something, you make yourself indispensable." Great wisdom in George Ravelings words and life changing advice. May we all find an edge and devote ourselves to it.