Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
The most important thing that a young athlete must do it pick the right sport. Not one that they like just a little bit, but one that they love. Because,if they don't really love their sport, they won't work as hard as they should. Me? I loved to hit.
I didn't ever realize that my ceiling would be this high, that I would be able to play at the major-league level. But here I am. I've been doing it for a while now, so it's certainly a blast. It's something that I want to cherish and make the most of.
I'm not head-strong, and I'm not egotistical. I understand certain things better now. I won't be trying to be play everyday. There's only one Cal Ripken, one Lou Gehrig and one Joe DiMaggio. What is good for them isn't necessarily good for Eric Davis.
I don't think it's the intent of baseball not to have black ballplayers, but we have to find a way to get these kids back. We lost them to football. We lost them to basketball. We lost them to golf. People don't see how cool and exciting this game is.
To be the first player to do it three consecutive years (fifty or more home runs), you go back through the thousands of power hitters who played this game and nobody has ever done it, and I can sit here and say I'm the first. I'm pretty proud of that.
Ain't no sense worrying about the things you got control over 'cause if you got control over 'em, ain't no sense worrying. Ain't no sense worrying about the things you got no control over 'cause if you got no control over 'em, ain't no sense worrying.
I used to get made fun of in the minor leagues. I'd be 0 for 2, and then in my last at-bat I'd hit a chopper that wouldn't even reach the shortstop, and I'd get a hit out of it. The guys would be all over me, but a hit's a hit. I'll take 3,000 of 'em.
Everybody in the league knew I had trouble with the inside pitch. I got away with it only because the great majority of pitchers were afraid of making a mistake in that spot. The threat of power is one of the best weapons you have in the batter's box.
I'm proud of everything that I've accomplished since I was a little boy. That was my dream - to be a ballplayer. I didn't dream to win so many Gold Gloves, or Silver Bats or play in All-Star Games or World Series. I was just dreaming to play the game.
It was part of the reason I almost didn't go public with my diagnosis - I was embarrassed. I felt, 'Oh, I've always talked about exercising. And I got cancer.' And then I realized it's a great example of showing that cancer can hit anyone at any time.
I sit on the bench, and I watch even my teammates swing, so you can learn from them when they make a bad swing or good swing. I like to watch from the rookie to the veteran player, and that way you can see the difference and learn something from them.
I don't think I'm a home run hitter. Most of my home runs are line drives. If I hit it, thanks God. But it's not the kind of thing that I think about. I just go out there and try to have a better season than I had before. Home runs are not in my mind.
There's nothing wrong with pitch counts. But not when it's spit out by a computer, and the computer does not look at an individual's mechanics. And you can't look at his genes. It should come from the individual and the pitching coach and the manager.
I've never felt overmatched on the baseball field. I've always been a very strong, dominant position. And I felt that if I did my work as I've done since I was, you know, a rookie back in Seattle, I didn't have a problem competing at any level. So, no.
I remember one time in my junior year, in my art class, our teacher had us doing, like, finger paints, and I went and put a stripe on a girl's shirt, and it turned into a big paint fight. Paint all over the walls, all over everybody. It was pretty fun.
Don't get me wrong; it's not like I didn't go out and have fun. But there's been a lot of players that come to New York and get caught up in the lifestyle, and before you know it, they're sent away to another team because it affected their performance.
I didn't understand anything about playing baseball. I started playing, and it was enjoyable. Most of my life, I played with older people on my team, in my league. I learned a lot about life. Every day in my life, I learned something new from somebody.
I guess you'd call me an independent, since I've never identified myself with one party or another in politics. I always decide my vote by taking as careful a look as I can at the actual candidates and issues themselves, no matter what the party label.
I was told I would never make it because I'm too short. Well, I'm still too short, but I've got 10 All-Star games, two World Series championships, and I'm a very happy and contented guy. It doesn't matter what your height is, it's what's in your heart.
I worked real hard to learn to play first. In the beginning, I used to make one terrible play a game. Then, I got so I'd make one a week, and finally, I'd pull a real bad one maybe once a month. At the end, I was trying to keep it down to one a season.
You can never completely get it - being a Christian - but I think I really got it when my first son was born in 2006. I just realized the love that God has for all of us. It was seeing my son born and knowing the unconditional love that I have for him.
Every time I pray, I ask for forgiveness. I'm a sinner. I sin every single day. But I do know that God loves me. I do know that God forgives me. It helps me in my every day life because there's nothing anyone can do to me that I can't forgive them for.
I have a food show.It's not just baseball people. It's a mixture of baseball people, actors, musicians, chefs and whatnot. They bring out different dishes, and at the end of the show, I give the one I like the most the "Fielder's choice." It's good TV.
A lot of people don't trust the pitch. There's this kind of reputation it has for being untrustworthy and fickle and capricious and everything else, and those are words that big league managers and general managers and organizations aren't too fond of.
Different people, different backgrounds, different ideals... We walk in different doors at the beginning of the day, and we walk out of different doors at the end of the day. But when it is time to go out on that field, we all go through the same door.
In the Dominican, there are a lot of kids who need help. I just do that for my mom because my mom liked to help a lot of kids in the Dominican. Whoever I am right now is because of her. She gave me the education; she always took care of me like a mommy.
I think about the cosmic snowball theory. A few million years from now the sun will burn out and lose its gravitational pull. The earth will turn into a giant snowball and be hurled through space. When that happens it won't matter if I get this guy out.
The teaching of any science, for purposes of liberal education, without linking it with social progress and teaching its social significance, is a crime against the student mind. It is like teaching a child how to pronounce words but not what they mean.
I'm a Republican. I'm a former Red Sox. I have a nasty habit of talking - a lot - about anything anyone asks me and totally unconcerned about giving you my opinion. You will never question where I stand - right or wrong, agree or disagree - on anything.
I've been hearing this since I first joined the Reds organization, that I'm going to be the next this or that. It's tough on a young player coming up. You show some positive things and everybody jumps on that and says you should be the next Willie Mays.
When people say (nice) things you take them as compliments and it's nice, but it won't help you win your next game. The thing I am trying to keep in mind is that relying on my past performance will not make me win my next game, it'll only get in my way.
There are a lot of shots in golf I can't hit, but I try to hit them anyway. The frustration is not there, because I'm still learning. But I really know how to do this. I'm not just hoping to get it where I want it... Let the other guys do it half-assed.
They only delivered the newspaper once a week where I lived in Oklahoma, and those people lived and died with the box score of my games. My biggest moment was winning the World Series because everyone in my town was able to feel he was a world champion.
I learned early in my life that sometimes I'm going to lose. I don't like it, but I accept it, meaning that I understand it's going to happen. But I don't see it like defeat; I see it like a learning process. Then if there's nothing to learn, I move on.
I never wanted all this hoopla. All I wanted was to be a good ball player and hit twenty-five or thirty homers, drive in a hundred runs, hit .280 and help my club win pennants. I just wanted to be one of the guys, an average player having a good season.
If you seriously aspire to be a manager in the big leagues, there is a baseball 'book' that one must learn. Alongside that book, you must practice Spanish. Of 25 players on each roster, sometimes there are between eight and 15 players who speak Spanish.
You can go up in the air and everything is gone. You know, you don't think about baseball. You don't think about anything. It's just something that takes you away from everyday life. I love being in a plane and looking down to see traffic on the freeway.
And I found out, the other part of it is that I found out and in my desire to life successfully, that baseball fit very well into my life. It's been a great teacher, trainer, mentor and you'll see what I mean in the next few minutes that I have to speak.
Circulating through the children's ward and seeing terminally ill kids, heads shaved, smiling and having a ball despite the tubes and needles sticking into them, I thought: What do I have to worry about? If God takes me, at least I've lived for 35 years.
Everybody believed you had to have a big piece of lumber and then muscle the ball over the fence. But by the time I and Hank Aaron - another guy who did it with his wrists - were through, there were a lot of guys ordering light bats and playing handball.
You've just got to keep playing hard. You have to remember that you are not just playing for the Twins. There are other teams out there. If anybody needs a shortstop they are going to come knocking on the door. So, you just have to be ready at all times.
Of course, I believe that Mike Piazza is probably the greatest offensive catcher in the history of baseball, only got over 50%. Johnny Bench is the best catcher in the history of baseball, but Piazza has all the record for catchers as far as offensively.
Right now what's in my mind is going up there and being disciplined. I was swinging at so many pitches out of the strike zone, and when you do that, you're not going to get a chance to hit strikes. It makes it easier for the pitcher every time I do that.
Baseball, to me, is still the national pastime because it is a summer game. I feel that almost all Americans are summer people, that summer is what they think of when they think of their childhood. I think it stirs up an incredible emotion within people.
Be honest and work hard to get what you want. Don't take shortcuts; you only cheat yourself in the long run. Success is not measured by money or fame, but by how you feel about your own goals and accomplishments and the time and effort you put into them.
I think these are the most difficult games to win, just every at-bat, every pitch, it seemed like it was important. The at-bats that the Nationals had the entire series, it just felt like it was a constant 2-2, foul off three pitches, seven-pitch at-bats.
When you're out there in the heat of the moment and you're pitching, and it's a big situation, you're saying 'Don't throw a ball, don't give up a hit, don't walk this guy.' But the harder you want to control something the more it gets out of your control.
Sometimes you just don't feel the same everyday, it doesn't matter what you do, but when you have people looking forward to seeing you perform for them, that puts you in the mood, and that's natural in Boston. That's why it's such a special place to play.
I was going to be the best paper boy ever. I used my Sting-Ray bike and got the papers there after school. People know I porched everything. No roofs, no lawns. I stopped the bike and nailed it. And if I ever missed, I would go pick it up and do it right.
People recognize me wherever I go, where it used to be just New York. I guess people who aren't even baseball fans watch the World Series. I was driving down the freeway in Los Angeles over the winter and a guy pulled up next to me and gave me the finger.