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I think the author's point was that you don't need to have exceptional talent to get into that 5% range. Basically that consistent hard work will get you there

by mvc 7y ago

I think the author's point was that you don't need to have exceptional talent to get into that 5% range. Basically that consistent hard work will get you there. I think this actually would apply to football scholarships. Remember not all people who win a scholarship are going to become professional players. I suspect that is probably <1% for which exceptional talent is required (in addition to consistent hard work). Of course it is easier to put in that hard work when the support structures are in place at home/school.

inerte 7y ago
A quick search shows there's ~1M high school players, and only 7.1% become college players https://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/research/football-probability-competing-beyond-high-school https://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/research/football-proba... and then from these ~73k college players, only 1.6% become professionals https://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/research/estimated-probability-competing-professional-athletics https://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/research/estimated-prob... I think high school and college players work really, really hard. Getting ahead of 92.9% of other hard working players, followed by beating 98.5% of this already small group, is certainly a feat. Sure, it's "basically consistent hard work", but distilling years of practice, coaching, diet, personal life sacrifices, into just "so really all it takes is working hard" is an oversimplification that doesn't do justice to the actual reality involved.