An annual motivational tool for his sidelined players, the story of Wally Pipp is clearly one of John Calipari’s favorites.
According to baseball folklore, Pipp, the New York Yankees starting first baseman, asked for a day off due to a headache. A 21-year-old Lou Gehrig played in his place, and Pipp never got his job back.
The moral of the story, in Calipari’s words: “When you come out and you’re not playing, understand other people are moving by. That’s just how it is.”
The truth of the story is that Pipp was mired in the worst season of his career, the Yankees were slumping across the board, and New York Manager Miller Huggins inserted the promising young Gehrig into the starting lineup to shake things up.