Feel for the Game
One of my favorite things during championship season is listening closely to how leaders make decisions under pressure.
Not just the strategy.
The moments underneath it.
Because pressure has a way of exposing what leaders really trust.
In Game 4 of the American League Championship Series, Blue Jays manager John Schneider walked to the mound to check on Max Scherzer, his fiery 41-year-old pitcher. The Blue Jays led 5–1, and most assumed he’d make the change.
In an article in The Athletic, the moment was described as “a perfect illustration of intuitive decision-making.”
He screamed, nodded, and stared daggers through his manager — a classic Mad Max moment. Schneider turned and walked away, leaving Scherzer in to finish the inning.
After the game, reporters asked what guided that decision.
Schneider said simply:
“I think at that point there’s numbers, there’s projections, there’s strategy, and there’s people.
So I was trusting people.”
That one line said everything.
Later he explained:
“In that moment, you kind of relive every conversation I’ve had with him over the course of the year.”
In a matter of seconds, Schneider drew from every interaction, every pattern, every gut sense of who Scherzer was — and made the decision to trust the person, not the projection.
What Schneider did in that moment is what every leader faces daily:
The pull between trusting the data and trusting the person.
🎥 [0:24] Watch — “You Gotta Have a Feel for the Game”
💭 Why It Matters
Today, leadership often feels like a battle between intuition and information.
We have analytics to validate our choices, AI to predict outcomes, and dashboards that quantify everything. But in the pursuit of precision, we risk eliminating emotion — the very thing that connects us.
The best leaders I know don’t suppress emotion; they manage it.
They listen for what can’t be measured.
They make decisions that feel right, not just look right.
Because leadership isn’t efficient.
It’s human.
That’s what made Josh Hart’s quote so interesting to me.
The analytics suggested Cleveland could help off him.
The numbers suggested he was still a non-shooter.
But Hart had evolved.
And while the Cavaliers were trusting the percentages, Hart was trusting the moment.
That’s the danger of over-relying on data.
It can freeze people into old identities.
Leadership requires something more adaptive than that.
Awareness.
Presence.
Feel.
Early in my coaching career, I followed certain basketball rules almost automatically.
One of the unwritten laws of basketball is that if a player picks up two fouls in the first half, you sit them.
It’s logical.
Conventional.
The “safe” decision.
And I did it — religiously.
The fear, of course, was the third foul before halftime.
But over time, I started to notice something.
Some players never fully recovered emotionally after being pulled. They came back tentative, disconnected, and afraid to make another mistake.
I told myself I was protecting the team.
But sometimes I was really protecting against risk.
Protecting against uncertainty.
Protecting myself from the possibility that trusting the player could backfire.
And in doing so, I was quietly eroding trust.
If I were coaching today, I’d see that moment differently. I’d pull the player aside and have a conversation.
Do I truly have a good reason to sit you right now?
Or is this about trust — or lack of it?
Can we co-create a plan that helps you stay engaged, manage risk, and build confidence?
Because what’s really happening in that moment isn’t about fouls — it’s about belief.
Does the player believe I trust her?
Do I actually trust her?
Trust is built in these small, emotional moments.
And our willingness to talk about them deepens connection.
Intuitive decision-making doesn’t ignore data.
It holds it alongside relationship.
“The data tells us what’s likely.
The conversation tells us what’s true.”
Data can tell you how to win.
But only intuition can tell you how to lead.
📌 Quote of the Week
“Leadership isn’t about choosing between data and emotion — it’s about integrating both.”
— Angel Elderkin
💬 Reflective Questions
Where in your leadership are you leaning on the numbers instead of engaging the person?
What conversation might create more trust than the “safe” decision ever could?
✍️ Closing
The world needs data — to sharpen awareness, reveal patterns, and help us make better decisions.
But the world also needs leaders willing to pause long enough to listen for what can’t be measured.
The whisper beneath the noise.
Thanks for dropping in.
📅 Ready to lead from the inside out? Let’s connect.
See. Serve. Empower.
— Angel
The Athletic, “Max Scherzer’s Viral Moment Was a Perfect Illustration of Intuitive Decision-Making,” by Andy McCullough (Oct. 2025)