Is "It" Real?

This article about the "It Factor," from Grantland is good. Funny too.  It's about NFL quarterbacks, but can probably be extended into other realms. The "It Factor:" What is It? Does It exist? Does It come and go? Who has It? Who had It, and who doesn't have It anymore? Can you lose It? Or did we all just misread It? How do you get It? Who can recognize It? Is It real?

We think we know what the "It Factor" is, we can name people who have It. There are intangibles,  qualities, that we believe make up the "It." We think we know those qualities, (leadership, bravery, work ethic, charisma) and we swear we can see them embodied, see them in action. 

This is important in the NFL. Big dollars are attached to the question of "It." Every team is looking for that "franchise QB," there are scouts, and databases, and "evaluators," all trying to scope out that special secret sauce called, "It!"

How to explain a Tom Brady or Russell Wilson? How to explain that these two premier, Super Bowl winning QB's were passed up by every NFL team when they were available in the draft? How could all those experts miss the "It?" Maybe Brady and Wilson had "It" already, in spades, but nobody knew "It" yet, nobody saw "It," until, well, until they showed they had "It!" And then, well, of course, everyone decided that they had "It!"

Update: And what if underestimating someone's "It Factor," actually increases it? So in that case it wouldn't be surprising that Brady and Wilson were under-appreciated coming out of the draft, the under-appreciating was actually another element added to the mix of "It!" And maybe that under-appreciation will always be part of the elixir of "It," an element of under-appreciation adds an extra "chip on the shoulder," a little more "fire in the belly," which is then used as another motivator to show everyone that they were wrong about "It!"