Our Ask - Edition 9 of 9

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It’s August 2004 at the Athens Olympics. Michael Phelps is in the middle of becoming a global star. At 19 years old, he is piling up medals and swimming nearly every event.

The United States qualifies for the final of the 4x100 medley relay, an event the Americans are heavily favored to win. Phelps swims in the prelims, helping secure the spot in the championship race.

Normally, that would mean he swims in the final, too. But Phelps approaches the coaches with a different idea: He wants teammate Ian Crocker to take his butterfly leg in the final.

Just days earlier, Crocker had narrowly lost the 100-meter butterfly, one of the most painful defeats of his career. He was devastated. But Phelps believed Crocker deserved another chance at gold.

“We came into this meet as a team,” Phelps said. “We’ll leave here as a team.”

Even though Phelps could still receive a gold medal for swimming in prelims, stepping aside meant giving away the spotlight moment: the final, the podium photos, the race everyone remembers.

Crocker later said: “I’m speechless and tearing-up, I'm so proud to swim with this great team.”

The Americans won gold.

Here’s Phelps on how “the greats do things when they don’t always want to” (0:42):

https://tinyurl.com/3ap83mwz

Why It Matters

Elite teams are full of talented people who want opportunities, recognition, and moments that belong to them. What separated Phelps here was much less about competitiveness and more about security.

He did not need every moment for himself. He understood something many teammates never do: sometimes making the team stronger means letting someone else step forward.

The Teammate Standard

Michael Phelps could have swum the relay final himself. Instead, he gave the lane to Ian Crocker after Crocker’s heartbreaking individual loss earlier in the Olympics.

The United States still won gold and Phelps still earned a medal. But the moment belonged to his teammate.

Great teammates do not need every spotlight.

Sometimes leadership looks like giving someone else the lane.

Do your teammates know you care more about the win than the credit?

Our Ask - Edition 8 of 9

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It’s July 10, 1999. The Women’s World Cup Final at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Ninety thousand fans in the stadium, 40 million watching on TV.

The United States and China have played 120 scoreless minutes. It comes down to a penalty shootout.

In the waning moments of extra time, U.S. coach Tony DiCicco asks assistant Lauren Gregg to write down the five shooters. Brandi Chastain is not on the list. She is sixth, a reserve, used only if the game goes past five rounds.

Four months earlier, Chastain had missed a penalty against this same Chinese goalkeeper. She hit the crossbar. She blamed herself for the loss.

DiCicco moved her up the list anyway.

All tournament, he had watched her stay after training to drill penalties with her left foot, a foot she had never used in a competitive match. He saw something in her that the situation couldn't change. As he would say afterward: “Brandi always wants to take penalty kicks. Not many players do.”

Assistant coach Gregg walked over. “Brandi, do you think you can make it?”

She nodded.

Ten minutes later, tied 4-4, Chastain stepped up fifth. She later said she didn’t ask her teammates what order they were kicking in, because she didn’t want to interrupt what they were doing to prepare. She just waited until someone handed her the ball.

One thought: don’t look at the goalkeeper.

She struck it left-footed, inside the right post. United States, World Cup champions.

Here’s the kick and the moment that followed (1:13):

https://tinyurl.com/3btxy7m5

Why It Matters

• Penalty kicks in a World Cup final are one of the most pressure-filled moments in sports. Many players don’t love them. Chastain did, even after missing one against the same opponent four months before.

• She didn’t earn the moment by being flawless. She earned it by preparing through failure, staying ready, and raising her hand when it counted.

• Notice what she said about not interrupting her teammates: she managed her own nerves privately so no one else had to carry them. She didn’t make her moment their problem.

The Teammate Standard

She wasn’t supposed to take the kick. She had missed months earlier. She prepared anyway and, when called, she delivered.

The players who want the ball when it’s hard are the ones you trust most.

Do your teammates know you want the ball when the game is on the line?

Our Ask - Edition 7 of 9

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July 30, 2002, first half, Los Angeles Sparks versus the Miami Sol at Staples Center.

Latasha Byears grabs a rebound, pushes it up court on the fastbreak, and fires an outlet pass to Lisa Leslie streaking toward the basket. Leslie catches it in stride, takes two steps, rises, and dunks…for the first dunk in WNBA history.

The arena erupts, cameras flash, and Leslie’s name goes into the record books. Byears gets ready to play defense.

Few people remember the pass that set up the historic dunk.

Here’s the dunk, watch who throws it:

https://tinyurl.com/32xb3z65

That was Byears’ job on those Sparks teams, and she knew it. Coach Michael Cooper described her role plainly: do the dirty work, pound bodies in the paint, grab rebounds, and create scoring opportunities for Leslie. Byears, nicknamed “Tot,” ranked among the top ten rebounders in WNBA history. She started 77 of 90 games in her first three seasons and averaged a double-digit points with over six rebounds a game. She was one of the better players in the league, and she spent her best years making someone else better.

The Sparks won back-to-back WNBA championships in 2001 and 2002, a feat no team has matched since. Leslie was the Finals MVP both years. Byears was the engine nobody really talked much about. “It didn’t matter who scored, who did what,” teammate Delisha Milton-Jones said of that team. “We were able to put the egos aside.”

Byears put hers aside on every possession.

Why It Matters

• Every historic moment has a Latasha Byears, someone who did the work that made the moment possible, then got back on defense while everyone else celebrated.

• The teammates who define their role as making others better, not making themselves visible, are the ones so many great teams are built around.

• Byears knew exactly what her job was. She didn’t need the highlight. She needed the win.

The Teammate Standard

Latasha Byears threw the pass that set up the first dunk in WNBA history.

Her job on those back-to-back championship Sparks teams was to grab rebounds and create opportunities for Lisa Leslie. She was one of the best rebounders in the league. She started almost every game, and she spent her best years making someone else the story.

The Sparks won titles in 2001 and 2002. No team has repeated since.

The best teams usually have someone like Byears: talented enough to want the spotlight, secure enough not to need it.

Are you making the people around you better, even when nobody’s watching you do it?

Our Ask - Edition 6 of 9

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It’s Game 3 of the 2001 American League Division Series. The Yankees are clinging to a 1-0 lead in the seventh inning. Oakland has runners moving, and right fielder Shane Spencer fields a ball in the corner and guns it home.

The throw sails over both cutoff men. There is no play.

Except Derek Jeter appears out of nowhere at the first-base foul line, 60 feet from where a shortstop is supposed to be, catches the ball on the run, and flips it backhanded to catcher Jorge Posada. Jeremy Giambi is out at the plate. The lead holds.

Mike Mussina, the Yankees pitcher on the mound, looked over his shoulder mid-play and said: “Where did he come from? How did that just happen?”

Here’s the flip, one of the most iconic defensive plays in baseball history (0:52):

https://tinyurl.com/4pj2se9t

The answer to Mussina’s question was preparation.

“I am big on preparation,” Jeter told ESPN years later. “I always just run through all the possible scenarios in my head before they happen. You have all these checkpoints in your head. So when the ball went down the line, it was something I had prepared for. I was in the position I was supposed to be. That’s the way I always looked at it.”

He wasn’t surprised. He was already there.

Ten years later, in a regular-season game against Tampa Bay, a nearly identical play developed. Cameras caught Jeter drifting toward the same spot along the first-base line, reading the throw, tracking the runner, before the cutoff man got it cleanly and made the play. The moment went unnoticed. Jeter never got to make the flip. He was just there again, in the right place, because he always was.

Why It Matters

• The plays that look like instinct are usually the result of preparation so thorough that the right response has become automatic. You don’t think your way into the right position in a playoff game; you practice your way there.

• Many players are where they’re supposed to be when someone is watching. The best teammates are where they’re supposed to be on every pitch, in every situation, whether the ball comes to them or not.

• Coaches and teammates notice who is locked in when the play isn’t theirs. That awareness, that presence, is what earns you trust when the moment is real.

The Teammate Standard

Nobody sent Derek Jeter to that spot. No coach called it. There was no time.

He was there because he had already run the scenario in his head: the ball down the line, the throw sailing, the runner heading home. He had prepared for a play that almost never happens, on every pitch, for years.

When it finally happened in a playoff game, he was exactly where he was supposed to be.

The biggest plays usually go to the players who are already in position before anyone knows they’ll need to be.

Are you ready for the play that almost never happens?

Our Ask - Edition 5 of 9

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The night before the 2018 World Championships, Simone Biles ended up in the emergency room.

The pain she’d written off as pre-meet nerves had turned into something else: waves of agony that left her on the floor of her hotel room. A CT scan confirmed a kidney stone. Doctors told her to stay overnight, but she grabbed her bag and discharged herself.

She had a competition in the morning. She had teammates counting on her score.

“The kidney stone can wait,” Biles tweeted. “Doing it for my team.”

She named the kidney stone “the Doha Pearl.”

Here’s Biles talking about it right after competing, saying, “I’m here for the team” (1:17):

https://tinyurl.com/33nzwxcm

She couldn’t take painkillers; doping rules prohibited it. She competed anyway. “The pain was coming in waves,” she said. “I was walking around and then I’d be literally crawling on the floor because it hurt so bad.”

Then she went out and posted the highest all-around score in the world since her own 2016 Olympic gold. Her teammates didn’t know how bad it was until…afterwards.

That was the point.

Why It Matters

• There’s a version of toughness that performs for the crowd, and a version that just handles it so the team doesn’t have to. Biles did the second kind.

• Your teammates will remember the moments you showed up when it cost you something, not because you announced it or posted about on social media, but because they found out later.

• This is not about playing through injuries you shouldn’t. Sometimes the right call is sitting out. Sometimes, that’s the best way to help your teammates and protect your body so you can come back is its own form of showing up for your team.

• What you absorb privately so your team doesn’t have to: that’s one of the least visible and most important things a teammate can do.

The Teammate Standard

The night before the 2018 World Championships, Simone Biles checked herself out of the ER with a kidney stone.

She named it, went to sleep, and competed the next morning. Her teammates didn’t know how bad it was until it was over.

She finished with the highest all-around score in the world.

Many of the best teammates carry things on their own so everyone else can focus. They don’t make their problems the team’s problems. They handle it and show up.

What are you absorbing (or taking on) so your teammates don’t have to?

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It’s Game 6 of the 1997 NBA Finals. The score between the Chicago Bulls and Utah Jazz is even at 86. With Under 30 seconds on the clock, Dennis Rodman grabs a rebound and Chicago calls timeout.

In the huddle, Coach Phil Jackson draws up the play. Everyone in the building assumes the same thing: the ball is going to Michael Jordan.

Jordan knew it, too. So he turned to Steve Kerr and said, “‘This is your chance,’ because I knew (John) Stockton is going to come over and help and I’m going to come to you.”

Kerr had been struggling in the series, shooting only ~30 percent from the field. But he remained confident in his ability. His response to Jordan: “I’ll be ready, I’ll knock it down.”

The play unfolded exactly as Jordan predicted. He caught the ball on the left wing, drove, and drew the double-team. He pump-faked, stepped through, and then found the wide open Kerr near the top of the key.

Kerr nailed the jumper to put the Bulls ahead with five seconds left.

Here’s the play that sealed the Bulls’ second consecutive NBA championship, and their fifth championship in seven years (1:38)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWy-5hZW9mI

“He’s so good that he draws so much attention, and his excellence gave me the chance to hit the game-winning shot in the NBA Finals,” Kerr recalled. “What a thrill. I owe him everything.”

None of it happens without the years of full-effort preparation that made Jordan trust Kerr in the first place. Kerr was a reserve for most of that series, but he still took every rep with intention. He stayed ready. When the moment came, he delivered.

Why It Matters

• Players who stay ready, mentally and physically, in a reserve role give their team a resource most opponents don’t have: a trusted option in high-pressure moments.

• Coaches don’t call on players they aren’t sure about when the game is on the line. Kerr had earned that trust long before Game 6.

• Deliberate preparation is a form of leadership. It signals to everyone around you that the team comes before your playing time.

The Teammate Standard

The players who change games aren’t always the ones who play the most. They can be the ones who stay ready the longest.

Are your preparing like your moment is coming? Are you building game reps in practice, or waiting for the game to do it for you?

He never checked out. Film from those seasons shows him on the edge of the bench nearly every possession: hands on his knees, calling switches, pumping his fist when shots fell.

One Boston writer noted that Smart’s sideline presence was so consistent that teammates said they could feel it. Not metaphorically, but literally, they could hear him, see him, sense the energy from the bench. When Smart took over as a starter, he was already leading. The role just caught up to him.

Here’s Smart mic’d up during the 2022 NBA Finals (0:31)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5a0lOysUhSQ

Many teammates decide how to behave based on whether they’re playing. Smart decided how to behave, and the playing followed.

Why it Matters

• Your bench energy is visible. Your teammates feel it, even when you think you’re invisible.

• Coaches are often tracking who stays locked in when they’re not in the game. That’s usually what decides the rotation.

• Culture is built in the margins. Great teammates lead in the moments nobody tracks.

The Teammate Standard

You don’t have to be in the game to affect the game.

Marcus Smart didn’t wait to be a starter before he started leading. He was locked in on the bench every single possession: hands on his knees, calling switches, fist pumping on every shot, even when he sat for whole quarters.

His teammates said they could literally feel his energy from the sideline. He didn’t lead because of his role. He led, and the role followed.

What does your energy look like when you’re on the bench?

Her coach, James Galanis, documented their sessions: two, sometimes three times a day. When drills ended, Lloyd ran more. When Lloyd was exhausted, Lloyd ran more, not because a coach was watching, and not because it would change what had already happened. It was because her effort standard wasn’t connected to results, it was something she kept for herself, regardless.

Before we go further, here’s Lloyd on work ethic (1:46):

https://youtube.com/watch?si=0h2vQPb8BCTIsOwH&v=qOc2G5DLVis&feature=youtu.be

Eventually, the results followed: a gold medal, two World Cup titles, and a 2015 World Cup Final where she scored three goals in the first sixteen minutes — one of the most iconic individual performances in the history of the sport.

But those sixteen minutes were built on a thousand sprints nobody saw.

Why it Matters

• Effort when no one is watching is how standards get built. What you do at the end of a brutal practice is who you actually are.

• The gap between good teammates and great ones usually lives in the extra rep, the sprint that didn’t have to happen, the choice to keep going when stopping would have been fine.

• Teammates who hold an effort standard for themselves, not for the score, not for the coach, are the ones you want next to you in a close game.

The Teammate Standard

Before Carli Lloyd scored a hat trick in the World Cup Final, she was told she wasn’t good enough for the national team.

She went home and trained twice a day. When sessions ended, she kept running. Not to impress anyone, and not because a coach was watching. Her effort was a standard she held for herself no matter what.

Those sprints when nobody was watching are what built the career everyone saw.

Teammates who compete hardest when it costs them something are usually the ones you trust most when it counts.

What does your effort look like when no one’s tracking it?

Recently, Team Mexico beat Brazil 16-0 in the 2026 World Baseball Classic. The game was called after six innings. By any measure, they were done.

But they weren’t done.

Before leaving the Daikin Park (Houston) dugout, players and staff grabbed brooms. They swept the floor, picked up trash, and cleared just about every sunflower seed from the ground. When they walked out, it looked like no one had just played a game there.

Nobody told them to. There was no camera crew waiting for the moment. The footage went viral because a fan caught it, not because the team staged it for social media.

Manager Benji Gil has talked all tournament about the standard inside this clubhouse. “The game was tight for eight innings,” he said after their opening win, “and the Mexican fans’ energy never wavered. And neither did that of our players.”

The dugout said the same thing without a word.

You just demolished another team by sixteen runs. The easiest thing in the world is to walk out feeling like you’ve earned the right to leave a mess. These guys swept the floor anyway.

Why It Matters

How a team treats a space when no one is watching tells you exactly what their standards are when the game is on the line.

Respect for the facility is respect for the game. Players who show up that way in the margins tend to show up that way in the moments that count.

Many times, culture is what the room looks like when your team leaves it.

The Teammate Standard

What does your team’s dugout look like when you leave it?

Created by The Daily Coach team, The Daily Teammate is a new email written for athletes that honors and highlights what it means to be a great teammate.

We have often heard from coaches that they use The Daily Coach emails to reinforce team values, support their message, and start important conversations with players. The Daily Teammate is designed to make that easier by giving you short, shareable messages you can forward to your team.

Starting tomorrow and over the next 4 weeks, you will receive 9 editions. Each edition is designed to be easily forwarded, screenshotted, or copied into WhatsApp, text, or Teamworks.

Our Ask

Read each email and reply with one simple answer: would you share this with at least one player on your team?

If yes, tell us what made it worth sharing. If not, tell us why.

As long as we receive your feedback, we will keep sending you The Daily Teammate during this test.