When you’re starting a new job and the boss schedules a corporate training session, do you roll your eyes? Or are you one of those people who prepares to sit in the front row?
How you answer that could easily define your career and even the future of your company.
Don’t believe me? You don’t have to. Just ask a few NFL coaches.
According to Front Office Sports, the NFL has seen a record number of accepted penalties through the first four weeks of the 2026 season (963). In Week 4, the league witnessed a whopping 271 accepted penalties, which was second-most in any one-week span.
Some might say the referees are calling the game too tightly. Others, though, have a different idea.
Looking at the data, live-ball penalties are actually down this year, from 11 per game to just over 10. But dead-ball penalties are up a significant percentage, from 6.44 per game last season to 6.69 now.
To me, that screams preparation.
Speaking about the issue, Washington Commanders coach Dan Quinn said his team needs to play “cleaner” and focus on “mental discipline.”
Quinn said he even brought in extra refs for his team’s practice. The problem is that Quinn did this with his team sitting at 1-3.
The question remains, why not start earlier?
Football fans know: the preseason is often treated as a joke by players. Most stars and starters all but sit out the entire string of exhibition games. They don’t want to get hurt, and I understand that. But what is lost in the process?
By not playing in the preseason, by effectively sitting in the back of class with their heads down, the stars effectively punt their training programs. Then they come into the “real” games of the regular season, where early-season losses can doom a season, and have to do the training they missed while sitting out those meaningless training opportunities.
They treat the early part of the season as the time to get the kinks out, which can easily result in sloppiness, penalties, missed opportunities while the losses pile up (see: Commanders, Washington).
I get it. Football is a hard game and the league is only extending the season through those preseason matchups. But for those teams that want to win, the idea of throwing away plays, games, weeks is absurd.
In the NBA, legendary former Boston Celtics coach Red Auerbach used to push his team in the preseason so that they would be in the best shape come Game One. He knew that if his Celtics could get off to a hot start, they’d have every other team in the rear-view mirror.
Smart. Why don’t NFL coaches think this way?
Can you imagine a Forbes 500 company hiring new employees and then putting them in an office for the first month or two of their careers without training?
Worse, can you imagine a company hiring a top recruit and then letting them slough off in the back of the room during an information session?
What would be the point?
Yet, it happens.
When it comes to winning at the highest level, it’s no longer about talent. Everyone in the NFL, NBA and MLB is in the 99.99 percentile of their sport. What gets that talent over the hump, though, is attention to detail.
In business, just as in sports, winning is the result of good habits. And those habits have to start at the beginning.
If not, you’ll always be one of those teams in the rear-view mirror.
Not the one crossing the finishing line first.
