Baseball lends itself to a ton of inspirational quotes. I’m not interested in those at all. Thankfully, it’s also rife with wonderful personalities never at a loss for the best way to relate their profession to the masses and heap praise on their buddies. Here are some of my favorites:
On Sandy Koufax:
“Trying to hit Sandy Koufax was like trying to drink coffee with a fork” – Willie Stargell
My single favorite quote in all of sports. I was listening to the Jane Leavy Sandy Koufax book while running, heard this, and had to stop.
“I can see how he won twenty-five games. What I don’t understand is how he lost five.” – Yogi Berra
Yogi Berra is a noted quote machine all to himself so anytime he says something about another player is worth the time.
On Cool Papa Bell:
“One time he hit a line drive past my ear. I turned around and saw the ball hit his ass sliding into 2nd” – Satchell Paige on Cool Papa Bell
This is the perfect combination of a famous wordsmith like Paige talking about one of the great mythological figures of the Negro Leagues, Cool Papa Bell. Only he could describe the indescribable.
On Tony Gwynn:
Greg Maddux was asked about a hitter being able to identify the change in speeds by a good pitcher…
“You just can’t do it. Sometimes hitters can pick up differences in spin. They can identify pitches if there are different releases points or if a curveball starts with an upward hump as it leaves the pitcher’s hand. But if a pitcher can change speeds, every hitter is helpless, limited by human vision. Except for that fucking Tony Gwynn” – Greg Maddux
Almost every quote about Gwynn are from pitchers amazed at not only how much better he was at hitting than anyone else, but how happy he always was. Gwynn and Ted Williams had to have been pals.
On Ted Williams:
“I hope somebody hits .400 soon. Then people can start pestering that guy with questions about the last guy to hit .400.” – Ted Williams
It’s extra funny because Williams notoriously hated answering questions from the media and even now after his death is still the last player to hit .400.
“Did they tell me how to pitch to Ted Williams? Sure they did. It was great advice, very encouraging. They said he had no weakness, won’t swing at a bad ball, has the best eyes in the business, and can kill you with one swing. He won’t hit anything bad, but don’t give him anything good.” – Bobby Shantz
Even if you hate the Red Sox, you should probably love Ted Williams. You could hear how he was the best hitter ever every day and it still wouldn’t do him justice. It’s not a quote, but one of my favorite Williams anecdotes is about his birthday. Forever it was known to be October 30, except it was really in August. When asked about this, Ted said that he changed it so it wouldn’t interfere with baseball season.1
On Henry Aaron:
“Trying to throw a fastball by Henry Aaron is like trying to sneak a sunrise past a rooster.” -Curt Simmons
This is like the cousin of the Sandy Koufax quote. Aaron gets more credit for consistency than elite talent and that’s a shame. It’s both. I’m currently reading his biography so expect a ton more Aaron quotes in the next edition of Baseball Quotes.
Steve Carlton:
When asked about how he throws his famous slider…
“You hold it like this and throw the shit out of it.”
It’s just that easy.
“When Steve and I die, we are going to be buried in the same cemetery, sixty feet, six inches apart.” – Tim McCarver
I think I’m going to cry.
On George Brett:
“If he can hit .350, we (Missouri driver’s license bureau) figured he could see.” – Harley Duncan on why they waived the eye test
“Our goal is to get as many games rained out as we can.” – Dan Quisenberry on the team strategy while Brett was injured
I don’t know much about Brett, but just based on these quotes, I now need to know more.
On Willie Mays:
“He was something like zero for twenty-one the first time I saw him. His first major league hit was a home run off me and I’ll never forgive myself. We might have gotten rid of Willie forever if I’d only struck him out.” – Warren Spahn
“I can’t very well tell my batters don’t hit it to him. Wherever they hit it, he’s there anyway.” – Gil Hodges
“You used to think if the score was 5-0, he’d hit a five-run homer.” – Reggie Jackson
It’s not surprising, but there’s no single player it seems his contemporaries were more in awe of than Willie Mays.
Bob Uecker on Bob Uecker:
“I signed with the Milwaukee Braves for three-thousand dollars. That bothered my dad at the time because he didn’t have that kind of dough. But he eventually scraped it up.”
“One time, I got pulled over at four a.m. I was fined seventy-five dollars for being intoxicated and four-hundred for being with the Phillies.”
If I end up doing 100 of these, I will probably end each one with new Bob Uecker quotes. He’s the best.
Quotes: Baseball Almanac
Photo: Willie Mays and Sandy Koufax
- Amazon.com: The Kid: The Immortal Life of Ted Williams (Audible Audio Edition): Ben Bradlee Jr., Dave Mallow, Little, Brown & Company: Books ↩︎
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