Winners and Losers: A One-Minute Story

"You win some, you lose some," said Coach Jim Brodsky to the line of 22 somber-faced 10-year-olds. The boys were quiet, muddied. A few dirt-streaked faces were cut with tears.

Kenny had played the game of his life. Too skinny, too slow, he hadn't been a factor on the flag-football team this year, and he probably wouldn't play an organized sport again. But this day, he flashed through the defense like he was standing still, and ripped the flag from the opposing quarterback's hip before he could take two steps...and then did it again. They blocked him well from them on, respect he'd never received before.

Toward the end of the game, he had one more chance. The running back came around the left end, and Kenny reached and grabbed the yellow flag just as he went by. He ran hard, pulling Kenny off the ground, bouncing him along like a string of cans hanging from a newlyweds' car. The coach screamed for him to hang on, and he did, and the flag finally clicked loose, dropping Kenny to the ground.

But at the end of the game, their last game, they lost. For the first time all that fall. The boys didn't know how to take it. They'd never lost before. Some stared at the ground and kicked at the dirt. Others cried. The coach was grim.

"You win some, you lose some," he said. "Sometimes it's just not your day."

And sometimes, thought Kenny, it is and it isn't.

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