Tony Gwynn Research Paper

Cody Williams vs Tony Gwynn: A Comparison of Failures

Anthony Keith Gwynn, if I were to say his full name like that most people wouldn’t know who I was talking about, but if I were to say Tony Gwynn then it is a whole different story. Yes, I am talking about the Tony Gwynn who played for the San Diego Padres, and later become one of the most decorated baseball players of all time. Yet, just because he was such a successful baseball doesn’t man he never failed. His failures are what made the man so successful, and just like me I failed quite often. The game of baseball is full of failures, one being a persons batting percentage. A good batting average in the MLB is around .333, that would mean that every three times that someone is up to bat

I was in my Junior season for football, and it was looking to be a good one. We started off doing well, but we struggled at time, though we bent but didn’t break. We kept at perfect record of 5-0 heading into our homecoming game, and we had just came off a huge last second victory over a top-rated team in the state. I was injured during that game but failed to tell anyone, failure number one. I told myself that I was going to play the homecoming game because we were playing the worst team in the state and figured I couldn’t hurt myself any worse, failure number two. That game I ended up tearing my ACL on the 8th play of the game, and just like Tony Gwynn’s world, three strikes you’re out. Indeed I was, I was out for six months with five months of therapy. I was in a failure hole, and was looking to stay in that hole, but I soon realized that I can either sit and pout or come back better than I was the first time. My decision was to come back better, that was one step forward. For five months I went through the most grueling therapy I could imagine, but I never game up and I stuck to the plan that my therapist gave me, step two forward. I recovered so fast that I made it in time to play baseball in the summer, and later went on to be named All-Area team and All-district, step three forward. Finally, the time had arrived for me to play football again and prove to myself and others that I was better than before. We had another great season and won our first playoff game since 2005. I did so well that I earned first team All-District and third team All-State honors. I was one of the five from my team that made that list, that was step four forward, and just like Gwynn I took four steps and I was standing back on home plate, for I had hit a metaphorical home