Sports Quotes

• My motto was always to keep swinging. Whether I was in a slump or feeling badly or having trouble off the field, the only thing to do was keep swinging.

  Hank Aaron

• The triple is the most exciting play in baseball. Home runs win a lot of games, but I never understood why fans are so obsessed with them.

  Hank Aaron

• You can't win unless you learn how to lose.

  Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

• I'll be floating like a butterfly and stinging like a bee.

  Muhammad Ali

• It's just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.

  Muhammad Ali

• Basketball is like war in that offensive weapons are developed first, and it always takes a while for the defense to catch up.

  Red Auerbach

• Bulls do not win bull fights. People do.

  Norman Ralph Augustine

• If I weren't earning $3 million a year to dunk a basketball, most people on the street would run in the other direction if they saw me coming.

  Charles Barkley

• My family got all over me because they said Bush is only for the rich people. Then I reminded them, 'Hey, I'm rich'.

  Charles Barkley

• These are my new shoes. They're good shoes. They won't make you rich like me, they won't make you rebound like me, they definitely won't make you handsome like me. They'll only make you have shoes like me. That's it.

  Charles Barkley

• You know it's going to hell when the best rapper out there is white and the best golfer is black.

  Charles Barkley

• Skiing combines outdoor fun with knocking down trees with your face.

  Dave Barry

• You wouldn't have won if we'd beaten you.

  Yogi Berra

• Academe, n.: An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught. Academy, n.: A modern school where football is taught.

  Ambrose Bierce

• When I was 40, my doctor advised me that a man in his 40s shouldn't play tennis. I heeded his advice carefully and could hardly wait until I reached 50 to start again.

  Hugo Black

• Have you ever noticed what golf spells backwards?

  Al Boliska

• If you are going to throw a club, it is important to throw it ahead of you, down the fairway, so you don't have to waste energy going back to pick it up.

  Tommy Bolt

• Thanksgiving dinners take eighteen hours to prepare. They are consumed in twelve minutes. Half-times take twelve minutes. This is not coincidence.

  Erma Bombeck

• If a tie is like kissing your sister, losing is like kissing you grandmother with her teeth out.

  George Brett

• Sports do not build character. They reveal it.

  Heywood Broun

• I regard golf as an expensive way of playing marbles.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

• Nobody's a natural. You work hard to get good and then work to get better. It's hard to stay on top.

  Paul Coffey

• Any time Detroit scores more than 100 points and holds the other team below 100 points they almost always win.

  Doug Collins

• New Yorkers love it when you spill your guts out there. Spill your guts at Wimbledon and they make you stop and clean it up.

  Jimmy Connors

• All sports for all people.

  Pierre de Coubertin

• Gray skies are just clouds passing over.

  Duke Ellington

• I had pro offers from the Detroit Lions and Green Bay Packers, who were pretty hard up for linemen in those days. If I had gone into professional football the name Jerry Ford might have been a household word today.

  Gerald R. Ford

• I know I am getting better at golf because I am hitting fewer spectators.

  Gerald R. Ford

• I'd just as soon play tennis with the net down.

  Robert Frost

• Gold medals aren't really made of gold. They're made of sweat, determination, and a hard-to-find alloy called guts.

  Dan Gable

• The difference between the old ballplayer and the new ballplayer is the jersey. The old ballplayer cared about the name on the front. The new ballplayer cares about the name on the back.

  Steve Garvey

• Trying to sneak a fastball past Hank Aaron is like trying to sneak the sunrise past a rooster.

  Joe Adcock

• The only way to prove that you're a good sport is to lose.

  Ernie Banks

• Give me golf clubs, fresh air and a beautiful partner, and you can keep the clubs and the fresh air.

  Jack Benny

• Half the lies they tell about me aren't true.

  Yogi Berra

• Golf is played by twenty million mature American men whose wives think they are out having fun.

  Jim Bishop

• Baseball players are smarter than football players. How often do you see a baseball team penalized for too many men on the field?

  Jim Bouton

• You spend a good piece of your life gripping a baseball and in the end it turns out that it was the other way around all the time.

  Jim Bouton

• You know they're not going to lose 162 consecutive games.

  Harry Caray

• Nobody roots for Goliath.

  Wilt Chamberlain

• I went to a fight the other night, and a hockey game broke out.

  Rodney Dangerfield

• The difference in golf and government is that in golf you can't improve your lie.

  George Deukmejian

• Good, better, best. Never let it rest. Until your good is better and your better is best.

  Tim Duncan

• You win some, lose some, and wreck some.

  Dale Earnhardt

• He hits it long. His shoulders are impressively quick through the ball. That's where he's getting his power from. He's young and has great elasticity.

  Nick Faldo

• Baseball is drama with an endless run and an ever-changing cast.

  Joe Garagiola

• I went through baseball as "a player to be named later."

  Joe Garagiola

• Nolan Ryan is pitching much better now that he has his curve ball straightened out.

  Joe Garagiola

• One thing you learned as a Cubs fan: when you bought you ticket, you could bank on seeing the bottom of the ninth.

  Joe Garagiola

• The only time my prayers are never answered is on the golf course.

  Billy Graham

• The game of golf would lose a great deal if croquet mallets and billiard cues were allowed on the putting green.

  Ernest Hemingway

• As you walk down the fairway of life you must smell the roses, for you only get to play one round.

  Ben Hogan

• Golf is not a game of good shots. It's a game of bad shots.

  Ben Hogan

• I couldn't wait for the sun to come up the next morning so that I could get out on the course again.

  Ben Hogan

• I play golf with friends sometimes, but there are never friendly games.

  Ben Hogan

• I'm glad I brought this course, this monster, to its knees.

  Ben Hogan

• If we could have just screwed another head on his shoulders, he would have been the greatest golfer who ever lived.

  Ben Hogan

• Relax? How can anybody relax and play golf? You have to grip the club, don't you?

  Ben Hogan

• Reverse every natural instinct and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having a perfect golf swing.

  Ben Hogan

• The only thing a golfer needs is more daylight.

  Ben Hogan

• I don't want to play golf. When I hit a ball, I want someone else to go chase it.

  Rogers Hornsby

• People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring.

  Rogers Hornsby

• Always keep an open mind and a compassionate heart.

  Phil Jackson

• Approach the game with no preset agendas and you'll probably come away surprised at your overall efforts.

  Phil Jackson

• I gave it my body and mind, but I have kept my soul.

  Phil Jackson

• If you meet the Buddha in the lane, feed him the ball.

  Phil Jackson

• Wisdom is always an overmatch for strength.

  Phil Jackson

• Fans don't boo nobodies.

  Reggie Jackson

• Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they've got a second.

  William James

• As athletes, we're used to reacting quickly. Here, it's 'come, stop, come, stop.' There's a lot of downtime. That's the toughest part of the day.

  Michael Jordan

• I never looked at the consequences of missing a big shot... when you think about the consequences you always think of a negative result.

  Michael Jordan

• I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.

  Michael Jordan

• If you're trying to achieve, there will be roadblocks. I've had them; everybody has had them. But obstacles don't have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don't turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.

  Michael Jordan

• Just play. Have fun. Enjoy the game.

  Michael Jordan

• Boxing is smoky halls and kidneys battered until they bleed.

  Roger Kahn

• Football is violence and cold weather and sex and college rye.

  Roger Kahn

• Horse racing is animated roulette.

  Roger Kahn

• I was showing early symptoms of becoming a professional baseball man. I was lying to the press.

  Roger Kahn

• Tennis and golf are best played, not watched.

  Roger Kahn

• Champions keep playing until they get it right.

  Billie Jean King

• Sports are a microcosm of society.

  Billie Jean King

• Tennis is a perfect combination of violent action taking place in an atmosphere of total tranquillity.

  Billie Jean King

• Football is an incredible game. Sometimes it's so incredible, it's unbelievable.

  Tom Landry

• I play in the low 80s. If it's any hotter than that, I won't play.

  Joe E. Lewis

• Pro football is like nuclear warfare. There are no winners, only survivors.

  Frank Gifford

• A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.

  Wayne Gretzky

• Golf is a game in which you yell "fore," shoot six, and write down five.

  Paul Harvey

• Fishing is much more than fish. It is the great occasion when we may return to the fine simplicity of our forefathers.

  Herbert Hoover

• If you watch a game, it's fun. If you play it, it's recreation. If you work at it, it's golf.

  Bob Hope

• All hockey players are bilingual. They know English and profanity.

  Gordie Howe

• You don't play against opponents, you play against the game of basketball.

  Bobby Knight

• There are two theories on hitting the knuckleball. Unfortunately, neither of them works.

  Charley Lau

• If you think it's hard to meet new people, try picking up the wrong golf ball.

  Jack Lemmon

• The two most important things in life are good friends and a strong bullpen.

  Bob Lemon

• Perhaps the single most important element in mastering the techniques and tactics of racing is experience. But once you have the fundamentals, acquiring the experience is a matter of time.

  Greg LeMond

• You don't suffer, kill yourself and take the risks I take just for money. I love bike racing.

  Greg LeMond

• Baseball happens to be a game of cumulative tension but football, basketball and hockey are played with hand grenades and machine guns.

  John Leonard

• Life is about timing.

  Carl Lewis

• God made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure.

  Eric Liddell

• If winning isn't everything, why do they keep score?

  Vince Lombardi

• Show me a good loser, and I'll show you a loser.

  Vince Lombardi

• We didn't lose the game; we just ran out of time.

  Vince Lombardi

• The hardest thing to believe about The Fan is not that Robert De Niro is stalking somebody again but that anyone cares that much about a baseball player.

  Bernie Lincicome

• It is almost impossible to remember how tragic a place the world is when one is playing golf.

  Robert Wilson Lynd

• If you drink don't drive. Don't even putt.

  Dean Martin

• He hits the ball a long way and he knows how to win.

  Gary McCord

• He's got an overall flair for the game. It looks to me like he really loves what he does and he can't wait to get up in the morning, go hit some balls and go play.

  Gary McCord

• I don't know why people question the academic training of an athlete. Fifty percent of the doctors in this country graduated in the bottom half of their classes.

  Al McGuire

• The trouble with jogging is that the ice falls out of your glass.

  Martin Mull

• Baseball is a game where a curve is an optical illusion, a screwball can be a pitch or a person, stealing is legal and you can spit anywhere you like except in the umpire's eye or on the ball.

  James Patrick Murray

• I'm tired of hearing about money, money, money, money, money. I just want to play the game, drink Pepsi, wear Reebok.

  Shaquille O'Neal

• If you got the game, you got the game. That's why Tiger Woods is out there playing golf with Greg Norman.

  Shaquille O'Neal

• Boxing has become America's tragic theater.

  Joyce Carol Oates

• Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you.

  Satchel Paige

• What other people may find in poetry or art museums, I find in the flight of a good drive.

  Arnold Palmer

• Thus so wretched is man that he would weary even without any cause for weariness... and so frivolous is he that, though full of a thousand reasons for weariness, the least thing, such as playing billiards or hitting a ball, is sufficient enough to amuse him.

  Blaise Pascal

• Winners never quit and quitters never win.

  Vince Lombardi

• Winning is habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.

  Vince Lombardi

• Winning is not everything, but wanting to win is.

  Vince Lombardi

• Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing.

  Vince Lombardi

• The fewer rules a coach has, the fewer rules there are for players to break.

  John Madden

• I'll let the racket do the talking.

  John McEnroe

• He has the finest, fundamentally sound golf swing I've ever seen.

  Jack Nicklaus

• He's going to be around a long, long time, if his body holds up. That's always a concern with a lot of players because of how much they play. A lot of guys can't handle it. But it looks like he can.

  Jack Nicklaus

• There isn't a flaw in his golf or his makeup. He will win more majors than Arnold Palmer and me combined. Somebody is going to dust my records. It might as well be Tiger, because he's such a great kid.

  Jack Nicklaus

• What's a good tournament for him? Winning it. He's good enough.

  Greg Norman

• Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play. It is bound up with hatred, jealousy, boastfulness, disregard of all rules and sadistic pleasure in witnessing violence. In other words, it is war minus the shooting.

  George Orwell

• A lifetime of training for just ten seconds.

  Jesse Owens

• Eighteen holes of match play will teach you more about your foe than 18 years of dealing with him across a desk.

  Grantland Rice

• I guess there is nothing that will get your mind off everything like golf. I have never been depressed enough to take up the game, but they say you get so sore at yourself you forget to hate your enemies.

  Will Rogers

• It's a round ball and a round bat, and you got to hit it square.

  Pete Rose

• Olympism is the marriage of sport and culture.

  Juan Antonio Samaranch

• Play is the only way the highest intelligence of humankind can unfold.

  Joseph Chilton Pearce

• You can't put a limit on anything. The more you dream, the farther you get.

  Michael Phelps

• He's got everything. He' not a great player yet because he hasn't won any major championships, but it's a matter of time. He's an outstanding talent. I didn't realize how tall he is.

  Nick Price

• Overall the fundamentals seem to be there and he's obviously got a very mature head on his shoulders. He's got a kind of presence.

  Nick Price

• Bobby Knight told me this: 'There is nothing that a good defense cannot beat a better offense.' In other words a good offense wins.

  Dan Quayle

• One man practicing sportsmanship is far better than a hundred teaching it.

  Knute Rockne

• Hitting is timing. Pitching is upsetting timing.

  Warren Spahn

• There was endless action - not just football, but sailboats, tennis and other things: movement. There was endless talk - the ambassador at the head of the table laying out the prevailing wisdom, but everyone else weighing in with their opinions and taking part.

  Charles Spalding

• Most ball games are lost, not won.

  Casey Stengel

• Some people are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple.

  Barry Switzer

• When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.

  Hunter S. Thompson

• Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.

  Henry David Thoreau

• I want to rip out his heart and feed it to Lennox Lewis. I want to kill people. I want to rip their stomachs out and eat their children.

  Mike Tyson

• Baseball is a public trust. Players turn over, owners turn over and certain commissioners turn over. But baseball goes on.

  Peter Ueberroth

• Other sports play once a week but this sport is with us every day.

  Peter Ueberroth

• The integrity of the game is everything.

  Peter Ueberroth

• Success is where preparation and opportunity meet.

  Bobby Unser

• Golf appeals to the idiot in us and the child. Just how childlike golf players become is proven by their frequent inability to count past five.

  John Updike

• I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game.

  Walt Whitman

• Baseball is the only field of endeavor where a man can succeed three times out of ten and be considered a good performer.

  Ted Williams

• Golf is a game in which one endeavors to control a ball with implements ill adapted for the purpose.

  Woodrow Wilson

• Golf is a day spent in a round of strenuous idleness.

  William Wordsworth

• Baseball has the great advantage over cricket of being sooner ended.

  George Bernard Shaw

• Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play.

  Mike Singletary

• If a lot of people gripped a knife and fork the way they do a golf club, they'd starve to death.

  Sam Snead

• You can make a lot of money in this game. Just ask my ex-wives. Both of them are so rich that neither of their husbands work.

  Lee Trevino

• Golf is a good walk spoiled.

  Mark Twain

• It's good sportsmanship to not pick up lost golf balls while they are still rolling.

  Mark Twain

• Don't play too much golf. Two rounds a day are plenty.

  Harry Vardon

• Baseball is almost the only orderly thing in a very unorderly world. If you get three strikes, even the best lawyer in the world can't get you off.

  Bill Veeck

• Wrestling is ballet with violence.

  Jesse Ventura

• The bell that tolls for all in boxing belongs to a cash register.

  Bob Verdi

• What's unfortunate about buying a pitcher for $12 million is that he carries no warranty.

  Bob Verdi

• Adversity causes some men to break; others to break records.

  William Arthur Ward

• I always turn to the sports pages first, which records people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures.

  Earl Warren

• Hockey is a sport for white men. Basketball is a sport for black men. Golf is a sport for white men dressed like black pimps.

  Tiger Woods

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