I find Taoist hints in all sorts of places.  This morning, during my usual perusal of the Sunday NYT, I hit upon this story in the Sports section: "To hang In, a World Series winner Must Learn to Let Go."  Ah-ha, I thought, what is it that they need to let go of?  Their expectations and desires?  Was this another reminder for players like A-rod to stop thinking too much?

But the story wasn't really about that sort of letting go.  Rather, it discussed the likelihood that the Yankees will let go of some of their key veteran players, even though they contributed so significantly this year.  Indeed, the point of the story was that the Yankees should get rid of some players because they are unlikely to repeat the kind of performances they had this year.  They will probably regress toward the mean:

All World Series-winning teams face the prospect of regression to
the mean, meaning one-year great performances inevitably, eventually,
pull back to career norms. Spitting in the face of player- and
team-related regression fears, the 2002 Angels replaced just two
players from their championship team. In 2003, they lost 22 more games, finishing below .500 in third place in the American League West.

The Yankees face another regression-related situation. They had an old roster in 2009. Two of the top three starters, five of the nine starting batters as well as the Hall of Fame closer were 33 or older.

Regression toward the mean is a fancy statistics term but it has a simple meaning:

…a phenomenon that is similar to several everyday expressions such as "law of averages", "things will even out" or "we are due
for a good day after a string of bad ones". And one that I would like
to add is "it can't possibly get worse (or better) than this!"
Basically what all these phrases are saying is that "extreme experiences
tend to be balanced by less extreme experiences"

And when you think about it, that has a certain resonance with passage 40 of the Tao Te Ching:

Return is the movement of Way,
and yielding the method of Way

All beneath heaven, the ten thousand things: it's all born of being,
and being is born of nonbeing.

反者道之動；弱者道之用。天下萬物生於有，有生於無。

Way does not unfold in a straight line.  To the extent to which the movement of the seasons reveals something about Way, the experience of return – the transition from summer life to winter death and back again – is a quality (though not the only quality) of Way.  That is not exactly the same as a regression toward the mean, which technically suggests a "normal distribution" that will define general tendencies.  Nothing quite so precise is possible in apprehending Way (it is beyond our rational faculties).  But the more diffuse sense of things "evening out" over time – that extreme experiences will be balances by less extreme experiences – is a Taoist sensibility.

Thus, the article did have a Taoist hint.  It was advising Yankee fans not to expect an exact reply next year of this year's triumph.  Change will come.  Players will come and go.  That is the movement of Way, and we must yield to its inevitability – even if that means Matsui may not be re-signed (which would sadden me for a time, since he was such a clutch player this year).

Letting go is best.  Remember this line from passage 22 of the Tao Te Ching:

In yielding is completion.

If we let go now, another World Series could be possible…