Quotes About Baseball

When you look at starting pitchers, once they make it through year four, then - knock on wood - you see a lot of injury risk go down.

I have no problem with Gerrit. We had a rocky relationship in college, because he told me that I had no future in baseball and he insulted my work ethic as a freshman. I don't take kindly to those couple things, so we had our issues. And I have, I don't know, those feelings have long since faded.

I couldn't believe I was in the big leagues. I also knew that I have to work hard every single day to stay in the big leagues. One thing is getting to the big leagues; another thing is to stay.

Baseball players have such a bad rap of, like, 'We don't work out or we're not strong or this or that.' Guys work so hard in baseball, it's incredible. But people don't know that.

I figured my wife was about to start law school. If that whole baseball pitching thing didn't work out, I had something to fall back on. I figure I'd put a ring on her finger. Turns out she was the smart one. Turns out she was the gold digger, not me.

I just love putting on the uniform; it's what I have done since I was 6 or 7 years old. It's the life I know. If I didn't love the life of baseball, I wouldn't work out like I do every winter.

You're always going to believe in yourself, and I have to thank God for that, but it's pretty hard to believe that you can make it to the big leagues and that you can possibly get 200 hits three years in a row. I feel very proud.

I was always the kind of hitter that if you threw it 92 miles per hour at me, I'd hit it right back at you.

Where the ball went was up to heaven. Sometimes I threw the ball clean up into the stands.

I consciously memorized the speed at which every pitcher in the league threw his fastball, curve, and slider. Then, I'd pick up the speed of the ball in the first 30 feet of its flight and knew how it would move once it has crossed the plate.

Once upon a time, growing up male gave little boys a sense of certainty about the natural order of things. We had short hair, wore pants, and played baseball. Girls had long hair, wore skirts, and, no matter how hard they tried, always threw a baseball just like a girl.

I threw a lot of fastballs in college.

I threw a good fastball and changeup, but a below-average curveball.

Playing in the big leagues while my father is still active is the biggest thrill of my life. I try to see him play whenever I can.

I want to play the game hard. I want to ram it down your throat, put you into left field when I'm going into second base.

Baseball is a rookie, his experience no bigger than the lump in his throat as he begins fulfillment of his dream.

Today's Little Leaguers, and there are millions of them each year, pick up how to hit and throw and field just by watching games on TV. By the time they're out of high school, the good ones are almost ready to play professional ball.

You don't just throw the ball - you propel it.

I feel like a pioneer with the split-fingered fastball. I was the first one to really throw it pretty much 100 percent of the time. It was a pitch that I had to have. If I didn't have it, I wouldn't have been in the big leagues.

Ken Holtzman could pitch a game in ninety minutes. Wouldn't throw a breaking ball. And he had a great breaking ball.

It just tickles me still when you see Roger Clemens, as great as he is, throw a split-finger and the hitter just swings and misses. They don't see that ball that well. Jack Morris threw an awful good one and Mike Scott. There's a lot of great pitchers over the years that I think that pitch definitely helped their career.

If you can do that - if you run, hit, run the bases, hit with power, field, throw and do all other things that are part of the game - then you're a good ballplayer.

When he hit a ground ball to you, you knew you had to make a good throw because he was going to be running.

My mother has the same kind of an arm, even today at 74. She could throw a ball from second base to home plate with something on it. I got my arm from my mother.