Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I was lucky enough to watch my son hit a grand slam at sports camp, and that was great. Yes, I may miss some things, but honestly, I think I get to see more than a dad who works a daily 9 to 5.
Learning to fly an airplane taught me a way of thinking, an approach to problem-solving that was applicable and effective. Pilots are very methodical and meticulous, and artists tend not to be.
I've had teammates I didn't get along with, who hasn't? I've never had a teammate call me a bad guy, while he was my teammate, and if he did when I was gone what kind of teammate was he anyway?
Some of the most racist things that I've ever heard come out of people that are on the air at ESPN. There are some of the biggest racists in sports commentating, and you take it for what it is.
I won twenty-eight games in thirty-five and I couldn't believe my eyes when the Cards sent me a contract with a cut in salary. Mr Rickey said I deserved a cut because I didn't win thirty games.
I never doubted my ability, but when you hear all your life you're inferior, it makes you wonder if the other guys have something you've never seen before. If they do, I'm still looking for it.
I've always tried to do my best on the ball field. I can't do any more than that. I always give one hundred percent; and if my team loses, I come back and give one hundred percent the next day.
I've always enjoyed interleague play. It gives you a chance to see different clubs, to go to different places. It gives you a good chance to see where you are, where you stand with other teams.
Joe DiMaggio was the greatest all-around player I ever saw. His career can not be summed up in numbers and awards. It might sound corny, but he had a profound and lasting impact on the country.
Imagine if these computer geeks who are running baseball now were allowed to run a war? They'd be telling our soldiers: 'That's enough. You've fired too many bullets from your rifle this week!'
No matter how good you are, you're going to lose one-third of your games. No matter how bad you are, you're going to win one-third of your games. It's the other third that makes the difference.
Anyone can be a father, but it takes someone special to be a dad, and that's why I call you dad, because you are so special to me. You taught me the game and you taught me how to play it right.
Humbled by the fact that never in a million years would I ever thought that I would be on the same stage with all these great Hall of Famers and enshrined to the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
I have a big scar in my thigh from a dog bite by my German shepherd. His name was Ripper. He was trying to get in a fight with another dog, and I tried to break it up, and he got me pretty good.
I don't give a damn about any actors. What good will John Barrymore do you with the bases loaded and two down in a tight ball game. Either I get the money (more than Barrymore), or I don't play!
People keep telling me I never lived up to my potential, that I wasted my talent. . . I just didn't have as much as people thought. I got more ink for doing less than any pitcher who ever lived.
Not bragging by any means, but I could have done a lot of other stuff as far as working in films go and working in television... I had chances to do that stuff, but I like baseball, I really do.
They talk about those All-Star Games being exhibition affairs, and maybe they are, but I've seen very few players in my life who didn't want to win, no matter whom they were playing or what for.
It was funny, when I thought of it afterward, how Ruth and Gehrig looked as they stood there. The Babe must have been waiting for me to get the ball up a little so he could get his bat under it.
I won twenty-eight games in thirty-five and I couldn't believe my eyes when the Cards sent me a contract with a cut in salary. Mr. Rickey said I deserved a cut because I didn't win thirty games.
I would love to see as many of the black players as possible in today's Major League Baseball make every effort to go to the Negro Leagues Museum and get a first-hand view of how it all started.
The black press, some liberal sportswriters, and even a few politicians were banging away at those Jim Crow barriers in baseball. I never expected the walls to come tumbling down in my lifetime.
You always get a special kick on opening day, no matter how many you go through. You look forward to it like a birthday party when you're a kid. You think something wonderful is going to happen.
Yeah, I've always been very straightforward when you start dealing with injuries. You always have to communicate with the trainers and the manager and the pitching coach exactly where you're at.
And to play as long as I did and to have a family you have to be very blessed and I was with my wife Ruth. Ruth, I appreciate the job you did, and my three fine children, Reid, Reese, and Wendy.
No matter how much technology changes scouting, no matter how much free agency and big TV contracts change the business of baseball, I hope and pray that the heart of the game will never change.
Hitting. That's what I enjoy most. Realistically, it's probably the hardest thing to do in all of sport. Think about it. You've got a round ball, a round bat, and the object is to hit it square.
I never gave up as a player, and I won't give up as someone who wants to go to the Hall of Fame, because it's the ultimate goal for a baseball player or a football player or a basketball player.
A football team is like a piano; you need eight men to carry it and three who can play the damn thing The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.
When you're on a sleeper at night, take your pocketbook and put it in a sock under your pillow. That way, the next morning you won't forget your pocketbook cause you'll be looking for your sock.
I want people to know there are infinite possibilities in life to be grateful for. I love that people feel comfortable coming up to me and telling me stories about things they have gone through.
You know no one ever accomplishes something like this without a lot of help from good people along the way. And this is certainly true in my case, and I would like to thank some of those people.
Winning in Oakland in '89 was distinguished because that was truly a great team on a mission to prove that '88 was not what we represented. I look at that team in awe. It was a push-button team.
Back in 1987 when they drafted me. The Indians were the only team interested in taking a chance on Albert Belle, and I made the most of it. Hopefully, they got as much from me as I got from them.
When I arrived in Texas in 2001, I felt an enormous amount of pressure. I felt like I had all the weight of the world on top of me, and I needed to perform, and perform at a high level every day.
I've been back to the Kansas City area a lot in the past. My sisters went to college in the area. My brother went to college in the area. I've got friends there, so there's some ties to the area.
I just talked to a young lady, a freshman at Santa Barbara. She's taking a course, and Moneyball's one of the required readings. This young lady could dream of one day becoming a general manager.
My dad gave me a haircut... and it wasn't a very good one. When I went out of the house, my friends got on my case and said it looked like someone put a chili bowl over my head and cut around it.
You know the only thing for me, obviously the routine was completely different, but I had plenty of time getting loose. I threw enough pitches, took my time. Tried to time it out as best I could.
You visualize [pitches]. You see it in your head; you think it...I used to play every pitcher in my mind before I went to the ballpark. I started getting ready for ever game the moment I woke up.
When I look back at what I had to go through in black baseball, I can only marvel at the many black players who stuck it out for years in the Jim Crow leagues because they had nowhere else to go.
Your body is not made to throw like we throw. That's why you see softball pitchers pitching two or three games a day. It's a natural movement in softball. In baseball it's not a natural movement.
Did I put them in contact with the people to acquire them? Yes. Did I educate them on how to use them properly, and what way, shape, or form, and when, and with what supplements? Yes. Absolutely.
You had to pitch in and out. The zone didn't belong to the hitters it belonged to the pitchers. Today, if you pitch too far inside, the umpire would stop you right there. I don't think it's fair.
I think social media has allowed the players to be able to say things that maybe didn't come out right the first time and say what they really meant. I think that it keeps people fair and honest.
Athletes are going to tease each other. Football players want to be baseball players. Baseball players want to be football players. Basketball players want to be baseball players, and vice versa.
You know we just don't recognize the most significant moments of our lives while they're happening. Back then I thought, well, there'll be other days. I didn't realize that that was the only day.
It's kind of glorious to say, "Oh man, this guy had his career cut short." I'm not calling myself Sandy Koufax by any means. I'm not in that caliber at all, but sometimes it has to end different.
It gave me no chance. He (Nolan Ryan) just blew it (strikeout #5,000) by me. But its an honor. I'll have another paragraph in all the baseball books. I'm already in the books three or four times.
If you walk away, don't walk away with something still left in the tank. Then you're wondering like, 'Man, what could I have done?' When I'm done playing, I want to leave it all out on the field.