Quotes About Baseball

Every player had a roommate for out-of-town games, so I had to slip into the bathroom early each morning and secretly take my insulin injection. I feared that if the Cubs found out and I slumped badly, they would attribute it to the diabetes and send me back to the minors - or worse, release me.

And I'd be lying if I told you that as a black man in baseball I hadn't gone through worse times than my teammates.

In baseball, you can hit 40 home runs on a single-A-league team and never get paid a thing. But in a hedge fund, you get paid on your batting average. So you go to the worst league you can find, where there's the least competition.

I was a tomboy. And one of my first recollections of great success was playing baseball with the boys.

What I liked was to set the tone - set the pace for the team. I know when we're starting the game, I can get on and steal a base, then a guy bring me in. Then we're in the lead and in a good position to win. That was the most exciting thing - to help the team.

I was fortunate to play for Pete Rose and have teammates like Ken Griffey Sr., Tony Perez and Dave Concepcion. I grew up in the game with a mature attitude. I've always known it was better to be seen and not heard.

Tony La Russa was quoted as saying that I was using steroids back then, and I was talking about it in the clubhouse, openly.

A sports writer who covers baseball could go up to Tony La Russa and have a real baseball argument, and Tony would listen and it would seem reasonable.

Yadier was one of the first guys I ever asked for a bat to sign for me. I don't ask too many people for bats, and he was one of them.

I was a baseball player, I taught baseball, and all of a sudden I was in the business world. Now I used the baseball world to talk about their product. Not too much, just enough to keep going. Just be yourself and you'll never have a problem. That's what I did.

The difference between relief pitching when I did it today is simple, there is too much of it. It's one of those cases where more is not necessarily better.

I have an older son, Josh, and growing up, he just didn't care that much for baseball. And that was fine. But Chaddie, he always wanted to go to the ballpark. He just kind of took to it right away.

To put it better, we believe the radar gun will get you drafted, but you have to pitch to get to the big leagues. Tools will get you drafted, but you have to be able to play to get to the big leagues.

What's the deal with Johnny Damon? He can't hit. He can't catch. He can't throw. He's sort of the five-tool guy... without any of the tools!

I think my top salary was maybe in 1966. I made $17,000 and 11 of that came from selling other players' equipment.

Donning a glove for a backyard toss, or watching a ball game, or just reflecting upon our baseball days, we are players again, forever young.

Owners, the way they blackballed me from baseball, the way they used me, in a sense, and then the way they wanted to send a signal to the other players, saying, you know, we're going to get Jose Canseco out of the game. This is a cue or a message for you other guys to stop using steroids because the owners lost total control of the steroid use.

Baseball is reassuring. It makes me feel as if the world is not going to blow up.

You want to be as dominant as possible and you want to put some doubt in the hitters' heads. That's what I'm trying to do every single time I'm on the mound.

Any time you put Matheny in, that's good managing.

My greatest thrill? That's easy. It came the day Mr. McGraw named his 20 all-time players. I'm ninth on that list and that is thrill enough to last me a lifetime.

Home runs usually come in bunches for me. If I'm feeling good and I'm on time, I can drive the ball even more.

I was for a short time on the baseball team as shortstop, where I was not so good.

I've been watching American baseball on television for a long time, but it was only in recent years that, realistically, I've been thinking about playing here.