Good morning, Hank.

It's Tuesday. All I want to do today is tell you about  a goal scored in 1999 in northwest England in a lower league soccer game.

The hero of our tale is a fella named Jimmy Glass, who has the kind of name  a novelist might give a character who's both fragile and resilient.  Jimmy Glass was a goalkeeper and what is known in sports as a “journeyman”—  in his 15 year career, he played for 16 different teams. He was mostly a  backup goalkeeper and he played for professional teams and amateur ones,  and frankly, he had the kind of career that would be easy to forget, which is fine, right?  Like, we don't play football or write novels or whatever to be remembered forever,  not least because there is no forever,  at least not on this side of the veil. To understand why we do play sports  and watch them, you need to know what happened at Carlisle.

In 1999, Jimmy Glass was the backup goalkeeper at Swindon, a town known  primarily for its railroad museum and stunningly complex roundabout. It was  nearing the end of the season and Jimmy hadn't played much when he was told that  he was being loaned out to Carlisle United,  a proud club with a long history that was nonetheless struggling at the very, very  bottom of the English Football League. In European football, the best teams  each season are promoted up a league and the worst teams are relegated  down a league.

So theoretically, a club like Manchester United is only four seasons  away from not being a professional football team anymore. Four really bad seasons,  and we wouldn't root for that because that would be negative rooting, which we don't do,  despite the temptation. We do do it sometimes.

Doo-doo. So Carlisle had been in the Football League for more than 70 years and now they were  on the verge of relegation out of the professional Football League into the  semi-pro ranks, and that relegation can be absolutely devastating to a football club.  Like, it's not uncommon for clubs relegated out of the Football League to go bankrupt  and just cease to exist. If you scroll through Wikipedia, looking at football history,  as I like to, you see so much past tense, “Hereford United was an English football club”  and so on.

And that's where Carlisle United were— they were poised on the edge of the cliff.  And maybe they would have survived the fall, but maybe not. Quick break for the sponsor of today's video, Good. Store, which donates all its profit to  charity and in fact, did  not pay for this mid roll.  But Good.

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Store. Right, so Jimmy Glass only played three games for Carlisle United. And in the last one,  the situation was simple—win and they survive another season in the Football League,  lose or draw, and they're over the cliff.

Glass had a good game as goalkeeper,  although he did let in one goal. Carlisle United also scored one, but of course, a tie  wasn't enough. And then in the final seconds of the game, Carlisle United won a corner kick.  When I need encouragement, I look at this crowd when that corner was won.

They believe!  There's, like, a 3% chance of scoring from a corner kick, and yet they believe.  Then, Jimmy Glass does what a goalkeeper is never supposed to do, which is abandon  his goal. And Jimmy Glass runs into the opponent's box to try to be an extra attacker. Commentator: And up goes Jimmy Glass!

Carlisle United goalkeeper Jimmy Glass.  Everybody–there is not one player in the Carlisle United half. The ser– the corner kick comes in. Oh, the goalkeeper's tou– Jimmy Glass has scored!

Jimmy Glass! Jimmy Glass, the goalkeeper, has scored  a goal for Carlisle United! Just like that, Carlisle United survived.

In fact,  this year, they're still in the Football League. They played AFC Wimbledon a couple weeks ago. After the game, an interviewer asked Jimmy Glass, Interviewer: I mean, tell us, did you think  you had any chance of scoring when you went up there?

Jimmy: Yeah, always. “Yeah, always.” In the history of the Football League,  there had never been a goalkeeper scoring a goal from a corner kick until that moment.  And yet still, he believed. And yet still, the fans believed. And that's how hope works,  at least for me. Hope is the belief in an unlikely and inevitably temporary reprieve.  Every victory is fleeting.

Every reprieve is temporary.  And yet, the Carlisle fans were right to hope that they could score from that  corner kick. Jimmy Glass was right to abandon his goal and go become a striker.  It is true, as the old saying goes, that it is the hope that kills you, but it is also the hope  that saves you. These two competing facts turn out not to be mutually exclusive,  at least in my experience.

Jimmy Glass went on to other careers. He sold IT equipment, he drove a cab,  he's worked in football. And it's a strange thing  to be remembered as a legend at a club you played three games for.

I mean,  he's remembered for doing the thing that goalkeepers aren't supposed to do,  but he's made a life for himself. As we all do. As we all must.

Hank, I'll see you on Friday.