Hold on to the Rope

Climbers use ropes to ascend mountain peaks. The ropes have real and metaphorical meaning.

1. Everyone depends on everyone else.

2. You are responsible for fellow climbers.

3. You encourage your teammates.

There's a story about holding on to that metaphorical rope. 

"I told them a story my high school football coach had told me. It's a story about holding onto the rope. I called each player into my office and showed him a piece of rope that I threw over the edge of my desk. "If you were at one end of the rope with nothing between you and a thousand foot fall to certain death, who would you want holding the other end of the rope, knowing that his hands were so strong and that he loved you so much he would never let go?"

Well, Marty Lanoux said Jeff Reboulet, and Reboulet said Andy Galy, and Galy said John Dixon, and so on.  I said, “Fellas, when you tell me, ‘It doesn't matter who holds on to the other end of the rope, as long as he’s a teammate of mine’, then we’ll be one. We’ll be free to trust one another, make mistakes, and still feel good about our decisions.” 

If you listen to Celtics broadcasts, you'll hear Brian Scalabrine discuss the team "letting go of the rope" sometimes. 

I'm not exactly sure where the phrase originated, but it's worth remembering. "John Calipari, in his book 'Players First', says that the most important thing a coach does is teach their players to never let go of the rope. The imagery that I get from that statement is an action hero type character hanging on to a rope while dangling off a cliff. Letting go or holding on is the difference between life and death. Coach Calipari understands that no matter how talented you are, a relentlessness that appears insane is the ultimate difference maker between failure and success."

Don't let go of the rope.