Highlight for me:
In short, being rewards-focused is a miserable way to live, in sports and everywhere else. It's irrational and stupid. We all do it anyway; I'm as guilty of it as anyone. We create for ourselves a literal no-win situation, in which wins are the expected minimum and losses are unforgivable. It's such a crappy framework for living. It leads to burnout and misery. I dearly wish I would stop. A "moral victory" isn't a bad thing; it's the only kind of victory that has any value. We do ourselves and others a disservice when we denigrate the team for playing very hard in a losing effort, almost as much as we do when we celebrate a team winning with sloppy, inconsistent play. Every victory should be moral; some losses are better than wins. Yes, even in sports.
If you don't like it, read the arguments above it and decide for yourself what that means about you.
Highlight is the conclusion--last three or four paragraphs. Read it like a research abstract.
By the way, the general content would make a great life-coaching chapter, or book for the truly honest and motivated.
Kudos, Dash.