There is a wonderful scene at the beginning of a recent episode of Hard Knocks featuring Buffalo Bills’ head coach Sean McDermott addressing the team in training camp. He shares a story from his college career at William Mary where an assistant coach threw a chair through a window to motivate the team before a big game. While that worked for that game it was not repeatable in future games. “Consistency, consistency, consistency, is the name of the game,” McDermott told the team.
In the background, the narrator of the show Liev Schreiber intones: “It’s tempting to say that when the story of the 2025 Bills is finally written, today’s game won’t mean much. But the truth is, everyday matters. Because every day presents its own challenges, its own opportunities to grow, to get a story with a happy ending.”
This week’s Torah portion, Re’eh, echoes this sentiment beginning with a message straight from a modern coach’s motivational playbook: “See, I have placed before you this day a blessing and a curse. A blessing if you follow God’s instructions. A curse if you do not obey.” Moving forward, the Torah is telling us we have a choice to make, whether to stay true to our values, or to give into our baser instincts, abandoning all we believe in. Whether you are a modern-day NFL player or one of our ancestors, the choice is easy, but it’s up to us to carry it through. Go Bills!
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Alex