Gotta Have the Bod

John had a classmate in high school named Scott who was an incredible soccer player. He could do amazing things with the ball and was a prolific scorer. Scott was talented, obviously worked hard in practice, and loved the sport.

I got to talking with Scott one day and learned that he wanted to go to UVA. I asked if UVA had offered him a soccer scholarship and he shook his head no. He said he wasn’t good enough to play for UVA and I had to shake my head in wonderment. Scott was one of the best soccer players I’d seen over the years. He was fast, he had ball skills, he worked hard, and he kicked everyone’s tail in high school. I could not imagine anyone better than Scott.

When our son John got to UVA we went there for a fall visit and watched a UVA soccer game. I immediately understood what Scott meant, but did not state clearly. The players at UVA weren’t any faster than Scott, and their ball skills weren’t any better than Scott’s, but every man on the field was at least 6 feet tall and 180 pounds. Scott was 5’6” at most, and maybe 140 pounds. He wouldn’t win any headers at the collegiate level, and as a lightweight would be easily bumped off the ball by a heavier man.

Scotty was good enough in every sense but one; he wasn’t the physical specimen he needed to be in order to compete at the Div-I collegiate level and there wasn’t a thing he could do to change that. He had the love, he had the talent, but he didn’t have the physical attributes through no fault of his own.