No Place for Losers?

A fellow student once expressed surprise to me. He had never realized, he told me, that Harvard students are sometimes seen as arrogant know-it-alls. He never knew that anyone out there had anything at all against Harvard.

He was, of course, a New York Yankees fan.

As a storied American institution of a different sort, the Bronx Bombers bear many parallels to our eminent university. The Yankees just entered a self-declared “transition period” after concluding a seventh consecutive season without a world championship. Harvard, meanwhile, has struggled to define its new undergraduate curriculum and has not seen the top of its own league’s standings (at least in U.S. News and World Report) in a couple of years. Annual student satisfaction surveys unerringly place it near-bottom compared to peer schools. It bears asking, then: Have we and the Yanks suffered the same fate? When only perfection is enough, is failure inevitable?

One of the premises of a modern education is that in throwing together a diverse group of the “best and brightest” from around the world, we produce the best university possible. With much the same intent, the New York Yankees over the past decade have tried to lure the best and brightest baseball players from the baseball-playing world. Both institutions draw their superstars through an incomparable pile of riches and an even bigger name. And both ensure that many of those aspirants end up with a new sense of humility: Even with the finest facilities and greatest incentives, both see individuals crack under the pressure.

The baseball club and the Ivy have also each realized that community members sometimes cheat and deceive in the face of such pressure. Neither steroids-tainted Yankees slugger Jason Giambi nor infamous “author” Kaavya Viswanathan ’08 would likely be where they are today without an illicit leg up.

These great institutions have seen new arrivals suddenly realize that being a member of such a world-renowned pressure-cooker may not be so great after all. Every year New York seems to see another fine free agent acquisition’s career burn out, and Harvard faces the arrival of many a freshman for whom endless open houses and Annenberg ice cream are cold comfort in the face of a newfound anonymity amongst fellow lifelong standouts. Both departing Yankees great Alex Rodriguez and, by his own admission, UC President Ryan A. Petersen ’08 nearly cracked under such pressure upon first arriving. Only after these crises did each go on to distinguish himself. They illustrate the peril of newcomers facing an adjustment that the finest clubhouse amenities and undergraduate dorms, the best hitting coaches and teaching fellows, cannot alleviate.

So how can we respond constructively to the Yankees’ defeat? How can we avoid the trap of overconfidence and poor starting pitching?

We can learn, for one thing, not to take the Cleveland Indians of the world lightly, but rather to give them their due. We should learn not to confound our institution’s legend with our own successes and failures—neither to gloat over our Harvard predecessors’ glory, nor to feel unworthy when we try our best and still fall short of their accomplishments.

Best of all, we might start to take defeat with a smile and a tip of the cap, humbled but unbowed, without a hail of “Bronx cheers” or chants of “safety school.” For a school supposedly comprised of the world’s greatest, we could all stand to show some class.



Max J. Kornblith ’10, a Crimson editorial comper, lives in Cabot House.