“If Sports Were Six Sigma”

Posted by: meikah | 19 March 2008 | 12:58 am

Yeah, what would sports be like if there were no missed shots, missed serves, unforced errors, missed calls by referees?

I think it’s going to be boring. Remember a game becomes exciting when one player is racing against time and himself to score a point.

Actually, I got the title of this post from qimacros.com. So, if sports were Six Sigma, this would be the scenario:

If sports were Six Sigma, no one would ever make a mistake. (Actually, there would be 3.4 mistakes for every 1,000,000 plays, but teams might have to play for months to decide a game.)

• Baseball - Every batter would hit a home run or every pitcher would strike out every batter. It would take 333,000 at bats to get one out or one run.
• Football - Every kickoff or play would result in a touchdown for either the offense or defense (e.g., a fumble recovered and run in for a touchdown). At the end of four quarters, the result would be a coin toss and the point spread would always be 6 or 7.
• Basketball - Every shot from anywhere on the court would always find nothing but net, so everyone would shoot 3-pointers. The result would be a coin toss and the point spread would be 3 (no one would ever foul a player).
• Golf - Every stroke would produce a hole in one.
• Tennis - Every serve would be an ace or every return would win the point.

But then again, this is in sports. I think if you’re running a business, it’s not a question of whether it’s going to be fun or boring. It would be a question of cost. Delays, errors, missed customer calls, defects are costly. And cost is never fun.

Related story:
The World Series as You’ve Never Seen It
*Photo from Stock.Xchng

 Filed under: General, Zero Defects, Six Sigma, Sports | |