Part 5/9:
Baseball, unlike football, offers teams a glimmer of hope due to its playoff structure. A lesser team can catch fire and make a deep run, allowing fans and management to dream momentarily. However, in the NFL, the grind is different. There’s an entrenched belief among executives and coaches that, on any given Sunday, fortunes can change, which serves as both inspiration and delusion—leading to cognitive dissonance when trying to assess actual performance versus potential optimism.