Quotes About Opportunity

During my first round of law school applications, I didn't even apply to Yale, Harvard, or Stanford - the mystical 'top three' schools. I didn't think I had a chance at those places. More important, I didn't think it mattered; all lawyers get good jobs, I assumed.

From the Marines, from Ohio State, from Yale, from other places, people have really stepped in and ensured that they filled that social capital gap that it was pretty obvious, apparently, that I had.

I did some acting in high school and then a little more in college, and it just was the thing that I felt that I wanted to do more than anything else. And then I was fortunate enough to audition for and get into Yale Drama School right after college, and I spent three years there.

When I got into Yale College, got into Yale Law School. I've worked my tail off.

I remember, my first job when I got my working papers at 13 was as a vendor at Yankee Stadium - the old Yankee Stadium, with very steep stairs in the upper decks. It was all commission-based. And I think a soft drink was 25 cents, and I think you got a 10 percent or 11 percent commission.

The draft is a crapshoot, so I've been very fortunate to be drafted by the Yankees, and to have spent my whole career here.

I can always say I led off for the New York Yankees. It's an amazing feeling.

I'm very thankful to the Yankees and to Major League Baseball for allowing me to play this game.

I was trying to land an 18-year-old strapping first baseman from Blanco, Texas, population 200. His name was Willie Upshaw. It turned out there were only three scouts who knew about Willie - Dave Yocum and I working for the Yankees, and Al LaMacchia from the Atlanta Braves.

So to get to play for the Yankees was really exciting. Really exciting.

I knew I'd never make it back to the major leagues as a player. Lee MacPhail came to me and asked if I wanted to manage the Yankees' Fort Lauderdale club. I thought about it for a day or two and decided to take the job. That was the turning point. I knew it was what I wanted to do.

When I became the manager of the New York Yankees, it was an opportunity to realize my lifelong dream of winning the World Series. We were fortunate enough to succeed in our first season in 1996, and in the years that followed, we wrote some great new chapters in Yankee history.

I just wanted to go play in the big leagues. But possibly playing for the Yankees is very special.

I loved the opportunity to play for the Yankees, too.

After you manage the Yankees for 12 years, it's really tough to envision going somewhere else. But then the Dodgers called.

Do not quit! Hundreds of times I have watched people throw in the towel at the one-yard line while someone else comes along and makes a fortune by just going that extra yard.

'Stomp the Yard' was a great film. It was a great film, great opportunity. It's the reason I live in Atlanta to this day, that film. But as far as acting goes, it wasn't very challenging. I played me.

My initial attraction to 'Red Tails' was the opportunity to play a character that was not me. 'Stomp the Yard' was a great film, but I played myself there.

You have to get out there and compete. You have to work hard. People aren't just going to come knocking on your door and say, 'Please let me invest $1 billion in your back yard.' You need to be able to go and match the pitch and close the deal.

To join Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys was like throwing a baseball around in your front yard and somebody coming over and signing you to play for the New York Yankees.

We didn't have much money and my mom scrounged up $15 and bought us a surf board at a yard sale.

You want to fight for everything you can get, every yard, every drive, every opportunity that you have.

Everybody goes through situations like this. A tipped ball, a shoe-string tackle on a third-down scramble by the quarterback where he has 40 yards to run.

Being a Diva in a man's world, you're constantly in an uphill battle; pitching ideas, trying to get TV time, trying to get in-ring time, the whole nine yards.