The best part of admitting you were wrong is it gives you a stronger base to yell from when you want to chirp about being right.
I've been wrong about plenty. If you know me, that's not breaking news.
For example, when I first saw the preview for "Gladiator" back in 2000, I said to my buddy, "That's a straight-to-DVD situation." Well, it only won five Oscars, including Best Picture.
Or how about this — I went to Syracuse hoping to be the next Bob Costas. Yeah, that didn't really work out.
There was the time I stopped rooting for Ohio State because they kept losing to Michigan, but I kept my loyalty to Cleveland's pro teams. Guess who went on to win championship?
I'm the only person in my main fantasy football league, one we've been running for 15 years, who hasn't won a title. I thought Reggie Bush was going to be a Hall of Fame running back. And like many, after Kelvin Benjamin went down in August, I saw the Panthers winning 8-9 games. Oops.
But now, a few things I was right about:
After watching him as a freshman, I told anyone who would listen that Stephen Curry was going to be a star. I used something called Twitter while media friends made fun of me. And I preached patience when Panthers general manager Dave Gettleman was making over the Panthers' roster in the spring of 2014.
Because I didn't see his moves through the lens of a fan, perhaps I got lucky on that one. It made sense why so many didn't think he made sense, but without an emotional attachment, it was easier to see the bigger picture. It wasn't about winning in 2014. Sure, the ultimate goal was to produce a Super Bowl winner, but the second prong of the plan was to pave a path toward sustained success. It was building a program instead of taking shots in the dark with quick fixes.
Earlier this month, I used simple Twitter searches to find examples of Gettleman criticisms that now look regrettable in hindsight. With the Panthers now headed to the Super Bowl and seemingly set up to make similar runs, I've been thinking it could be entertaining to let folks poke fun at themselves. So last night, I asked Twitter this:
@BlackBlueReview where do I start? KB/ Ealy over Morgan Moses, KK over an OT or CB, releasing Smitty, promoting Shula, I have quit doubting
— Marty Wyatt (@MartyDWyatt) January 26, 2016
@BlackBlueReview thought Hurney should have hired someone other than Rivera, thought DG should have went after Chip Kelly, this feels good!
— Marty Wyatt (@MartyDWyatt) January 26, 2016
Dozens of responses like that came in, so let's open up the floor.
If you've been loud wrong about Gettleman and some of the moves he's made, are you willing to fess up with specific examples? Even better — do those opinions still live somewhere on the Internet?
If you'd like to share a mea culpa, you can tweet BBR — or for those who'd want more than 140 characters, you can use the form below.
Depending on the feedback, I may toss the best responses into a follow-up post. It'll be fun and maybe even a little therapeutic.