The High Cost of Experience

Experience. How necessary is experience? How much does experience really count? I always thought experience counted for something but I never realized just how important it is. That is until I recently watched two sporting events. Sunday afternoon I turned on the US Open where I learned that a young golfer had been playing the games of his life. Dustin Johnson walked up to the first tee at the famed Pebble Beach Country Club going in to this last day with a 3 under par. He was the leader in one of the most prestigious golf tournament of the year. It turns out that he didn’t even have to par the course on Sunday and he would be holding the trophy at the end of the day.

Dustin had in fact won other tournaments played at Pebble Beach. So he did have experience with winning on this golf course but not with playing the US Open. Long story short – he choked and did it big time on national TV. On the second hole he shot a triple bogey then followed by a double bogey and a bogey. Luckily halfway through the tournament they stopped showing him on TV for it was truly painful to watch. By the end of the day he was 11 over par and had dropped from a 3 under par to a 5 over par. Ouch. So it was Graeme McDowell who was seen kissing that US Open trophy instead.

The other tale of experience occurred Monday morning or more accurately Monday afternoon in England. It was the first day of the two-week Wimbledon tournament. Roger Federer, the six time champion of Wimbledon was up against an unseeded player Alejandro Fallah. I turned it on thinking it would be a quick match. To everyone’s horror the champion lost the first two sets and was a game away from losing the match. Fallah was playing unbelievably and the unthinkable was about to occur – a first seed player was going to lose in the first round. And then it happened. Experience kicked in. Federer took back control of the match and won the third set, fought hard against Fallah to win the fourth set and then pretty much played by himself as Fallah faded during the fifth 5-0 set to give Federer the win. Roger would now move forward to the next round while Fallah's Wimbledon try was over for this year.

After watching these two sporting events I couldn’t help but wonder about our inexperienced President. He does ok when reading from a script and he has strong arming Congress down to a science. But when something unexpected happens or he even speaks off script he chokes. He totally mishandled the Christmas bomber, Fort Hood shooting, and now the Gulf Oil Spill. It took him about two months with hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil spilling into the Gulf before he finally took action. And what was that action? To form committees to investigate it. Great.

But what if one of these inept bombers get it right and manage to blow up a part of America and killing hundreds or thousands Americans. Hasn't it occurred to anyone else that the radical muslims might be planning something big next year on the 10th anniversary of 9-11? What then? Why should we expect this inexperienced president to suddenly show leadership skills if a life and death situation should occur?

I realize that people have been asking these questions ever since Obama won. And I heard them but the value of experience never really sunk in until it was unquestionably demonstrated over the past two days. Dustin Johnson might have been experienced playing Pebble Beach but the pressure of being the leader of the US Open was beyond anything he had ever encountered. The pressure, the crowds, the TVs, and again the expectations that came with being the leader brought him to his knees. On the other hand, there is Roger Federer who I am sure was shocked to find himself a game away from losing in the first round of Wimbledon. Lesser players would probably have succumbed. Not Federer. His experience allowed him to dig in and turn around his game. By the fifth set he was in such command that it was Fallah who gave up.

Which is President Obama going to be when he is faced with a major crisis? Will he totally choke as the golfer Dustin did or will he emulate Federer and find some inner strength from his years of experience to not only face the crisis but turn it to our country’s advantage so that we come out a winner? I am afraid that we all know the answer.