Tim Brown: Unit Corp. Drilled

I have spoken a lot about going long in my columns. In fact, that's what I usually recommend. By going long, I pick solid companies that I think are undervalued but that will help us make money in the long run. It requires patience, discipline and smarts.

In football, going long is going for the big score quickly. When a wide receiver goes long, he tries to get by the defenders and catch a long pass from the quarterback. It's certainly not an easy play to pull off, and if you go to the well too often with the same play, the defense will expect it. That's why it's important to mix up your play-calling.

Mixing in plays on the ground to keep the defense honest is important. So is running crossing routes over the middle of the defense to keep the defenders on their toes. Basically, going long all the time in football just doesn't work. If it did, teams would be throwing 40-yard passes every down and moving the chains constantly. In order to set up those long completions, teams have to mix it up.

And that's exactly what I am going to do today. For the first time ever in one of my columns, I am recommending shorting a stock.

For those of you not familiar with shorting, it involves borrowing shares of a given stock from a brokerage house and then turning around and selling them to another investor. At a later date, you must buy the shares back, or cover the position, in order to return them to the broker.

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