Hope is a Powerful Thing

Imagine waking up every morning and not knowing where your next meal is coming from or where you’re going to sleep tonight. You may think that it’s hopeless that you’ll ever live a normal life. That may be hard for you to comprehend it’s hard for me to, but for Michael Oher a 16 year old black kid it’s reality. He had the slightest hope of living a better life and that hope led him to a christian school where white people outnumber blacks 10 to 1. He found hope in one of the families, the Touhys giving him hope. That’s why I think hope is the theme.

Michael Oher finds hope when his friends dad takes him with to a christian school for his son and convinces them to let Michael in too. Then a family that goes to that school takes him in as if he was their own. That family the Touhys feeds him, clothed him, and gave him a place to sleep. These are examples of new hope given to him and it helped a lot because now he’s a NFL star.

New hope is something you see in sports a lot. Like claiming the player you drafted is the star of the future and will lead you to victory. When Billy Beane started his moneyball campaign he gave the A’s new hope. He saved a dying franchise by changing the way he bought players. He gave players who thought their careers were done hope and the whole franchise.  Like when the Touhys took Michael in and gave him hope.

Hope is what drove The A’s to the playoffs and Michael to the NFL. It’s also what gave Frodo from Lord of The Rings the power to destroy the ring. Sam supplies Frodo with hope as he fights the ring. Frodo relies on Sam because all his hope in succeeding has depleted. Sam is a beacon hope for Frodo. Hope is what wins a battle and Sam had to have enough for him and Frodo. The Touhys were Michaels Sam there what gave him hope in succeeding.

Hope is what wins battles and Michael Oher's battle is no exception. He relied on the hope of a new start and got it with the Touhys when they took him in. He wouldn’t be as successful as he is now without the Touhys to help him through it. Hope is a powerful thing that can save your future from your past. If you have enough hope you can do almost anything.

Money ball Prediction

Once again the A’s are in game 5 of the champion series and it’s the ten year anniversary of moneyball now. Once again the Yankees stand in there way of victory. The Yanks are in the lead in 4th inning it’s 3-0 but the hammer back and score two off a bomb by Cespedes. It’s now the 8th the yanks are still up 3-2 when with bases loaded there pitcher hits Moss and a run scores. It’s 3-3 top of the 9th now. Yankees have a man on 3rd with 1 out. Then Cano flied out deep but a run scores. It’s now 4-3 with Jetter up and He homers then A-rod flied out to end the inning. It’s now 5-3 and the A’s are at the top of their lineup. First up is Crisp the A’s leadoff man. He singles on the first pitch which brings up Weeks. Weeks strikes out and Cespedes walks. Which brings up Reddick. 2 on 1 out bottom of the ninth Josh Reddick hits a long high fly ball that looks like it’s going to be caught but at the last second it sailed over the wall. The A’s go to the world series where they sweep the Nationals and Billy finally wins the last game of the season.

Billy Beane

In the book Moneyball by Michael Lewis it tells the story of baseball prospect Billy Beane's’ life after his unsuccessfully baseball playing career. It explains how his past experience helps him as a baseball GM and teaches him that money isn’t everything. Those experience made Billy Beane a good leader. He turns his 40 million dollar team from last in division to tying the Yankees regular season record. These are just a few of the ways Billy Beane changes his life and affects others in the book.

Billy Beane went from future star to draft bust in a matter of years. This is due to his lack of self confidence against major league pitchers. This changes his point of view entirely on baseball and money. He learned that no matter how much money they offer you can’t buy confidence. He chose money over a college degree. Would you have done the same if you had to choose?

Billy Decided to give up being a  baseball player to being in the front office. He became the Oakland A’s GM in 1997 which started his roller coaster ride as a poor GM. Under Billy Beane they reached the playoffs 4 consecutive years 2000 - 2001. This is because of Billys influence on the Oakland A’s players and coaches. In whatever way Billy influenced almost everyone in the A’s system. Including Scott Hatteberg and Chad Bradford two of Billy’s surprize players he picked up in 2001 offseason.

In the end Billy Beane proves that money isn’t everything. He wins with a team with less the half the salary of  some of their opponents. All you need to win is a different strategy. Billy changed from when this started. He started going for the money. He end up declining the biggest GM contract in the history of sports. Thats how much he regretted his decision to go for the money.

conflict resolution Money Ball

In Money Ball Billy Beane is the manager of a poor baseball team. He has to try to compete with teams like the Yankees. Every year his best players are bought by richer teams and he has to start over. Billy Beane is cleaned out every year and losses the best he has. This conflict he is person vs. society.

Billy Beane solves this problem by tacking up a unique way of choosing players. He takes undervalued player because they have small defects. After losing his stars he finds players to replace them by ther most important statistic OBP% (on base percentage). He picks two of the main characters that way in Chad Bradford and Scott Hatterberg.

Patriots Pen

Dear Veterans,

What is patriotism? Is it the love of your country or you having the willingness to sacrifice yourself for its protection and wellbeing? Maybe all the above all I know is our veterans did it all. They fought to keep our county safe and I’d like to thank them for their service. So thank you very much for keeping us from harm’s way and everyone safe.

I’d like to talk a bit about WW2. My great opa fought in that war but for the Nazis. He was KIA, killed by the men of the very country I live in today maybe even one of you. That war changed my family’s life because my oma was there as well. She was younger though. She was smuggled to America. Afterword and her husband served for the U.S. in Vietnam.

Vietnam was a scary time for my oma. Her husband was fighting in Vietnam. He uses to tell me stories before he died of all his friends he lost there. They were sad until the end when he came back alive. He died a while back from natural causes. Just a few weeks back my other opa died of a heart attack. Opa was with the military police. Now my two oldest cousins are in intelligence and army for our military. You have inspired them and me.

My two cousins in the military currently are more like brothers to me. They both lived with my family because their mom died. The oldest has been in the army for six years. The younger one just finished his first. He said it’s cool but he was stationed in Korea so he didn’t see us for a year. You have inspired them and now me.

Once again thank you for keeping our country safe. Some of you were my Opa’s inspiration others my cousin’s now mine. You inspired me deeply now I know that you’re my true heroes no sports players should be anyone’s hero you should be, you men and women that served this country. I salute you veterans and all that have served and will. Live long and prosper.

Dodge This

My brother and I were playing football like usual but then it started to rain so we came inside. After a while we decided that dodgeball sounded fun so we played for a while then it happened.
He through a ball at my feet. I tried to jump it but I landed on the ball and then slammed my elbow into the ground. l little did I know the severity of my injury. 

After icing it I couldn't move it. I realized I did something terrible. I told my parents and they took me to the hospital. After a night at the hospital they said I dislocated it and they couldn't put it back in. First I was in a cast for a week. Then I was in a sling for about two months. It was a pain because I couldn't do sports or lots of other things without trouble. It also made me miss a week or two of school so lots of homework as well

My family had to spend lots of money to pay for my hospital stay. They also had to help me with everyday task like brushing my teeth and had to do my chores which wasn’t bad for me. But for them a pain so I felt bad for a while. After that experience I learned that I should really think things through instead of just diving right in and hoping for the best.

The Hobbit Cause and Effect

In the hobbit Bilbo Baggins gets stuck In a mine when he stumbles upon a ring. The ring turned out to be a evil magical and it turned the wearer invisible. The ring saves Bilbo numerous time throughout his time with it. This caused him to slowly lose his mind. Even in the very mine he found it. Goblins would have killed him before he even got close to escaping the terrifying dark of the mine. It’s also the main component of the sequels. For Frodo Baggins is the ring bearer in the Lord of the Rings series. The creature Gollum was the ring bearer before he lost it but he was captured by the rings creator some years later because the creator is the only one that can wield the ring for full potential.

If Gollum had not lost the ring the creator would have regained power and destroyed middle earth as we know it. Who knows what would have happened to the members of the fellowship from the sequels. They’d most likely become slaves or be killed trying to protect their lands. If Bilbo doesn’t find the ring though he didn’t know it middle earth would have most likely been destroyed and everyone he knew killed or enslaved in the process. Bilbo saved middle earth in the process of his seemingly pointless adventure at the time. Bilbo saved everyone that night in the mine with just one accidental stumble.