Baseball is ninety percent mental and the other half is physical.

My all-time favorite Berra quote, this illustrates what I feel is the most essential part of truly great quizzing. Focus. I wrote about this a few weeks ago, and I believe that what separates good quizzers from champions is the ability to focus for 28 games.

It ain't over till it's over.

Another classic, and the quintessential competitive truth. We've all seen spectacular comebacks, and I've been thrilled to be part of a few. Marcae's dad, Ron Johnson, taught me that a truly dominant quizzer can take the first five or the last five questions of any game. That's the stuff that legendary comebacks are made of.

We made too many wrong mistakes.

Mistakes will just kill a good team. Missed questions, especially turnovers, have washed out the hopes of so many teams that were favored to win Nationals. This is part of being focused and disciplined.

The other teams could make trouble for us if they win.

Every game has one winner and one loser (or winning team with the least amount of points, if you're fragile). I like to think of this quote more in context of the spoilers. How many times has a team that's out of contention taken out a giant or two, forever altering the landscape of the tournament? Winners start by beating the teams they are supposed to beat.

Slump? I ain't in no slump... I just ain't hitting.

I have seen quizzers who were slumping, and I've seen quizzers that just weren't quizzing. I spent my entire Freshman year in a slump. I also had tournaments where I just wasn't quizzing (every year at St. Louis, for example). The difference is whether the problem is mechanics, poor timing, lack of study, or simply bad luck. The trick to breaking a slump usually means fixing something that wrong. If you're just not quizzing, it's probably a mental thing, and that can be corrected by a good coach.

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