I had been playing for a while, and I asked Louisville Slugger to send me a dozen flame treated bats. But when I got it, I realized they had sent me a box of ashes.

Reading isn’t good for a ballplayer. Not good for his eyes. If my eyes went bad even a little bit I couldn’t hit home runs. So I gave up reading.

I have always thought I was the best ever player.

We don’t want people to leave the stadium until the game finishes.

Players today moan about the number of games, but when you’re young, you can’t play enough.

They’ll forget all the rubbish when I’ve gone, and they’ll remember the football. If only one person thinks I’m the best player in the world, that’s good enough for me.

Volleyball, I could be pretty good. After a few practices I could be that striker, or whatever they call it.

I don’t think there’s been anything in the game of football in my lifetime that has changed college football more than redshirting.

It would be an egregious mistake to ever refer to me in the same breath as most of the people I write about.

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.

Every season is a new challenge to me, and I always set out to improve in terms of games, goals, assists.

In all my years of baseball, I have always expected to be traded. I never liked the idea.

Even if soccer is not number one in the United States, they do things very well here. There’s much our country can learn from the U.S.A., because we all know that soccer is not the main game in India. We can still do more things, like provide better facilities for the players so they can perform well.

I don’t think there is anything wrong in earning money from the sport you love. If you work hard and get benefits from it, there is no harm. The day you feel that you are not working hard and are only looking at the benefits, that’s where the problem is.

I felt unhappy and trapped. If I left baseball, where could I go, what could I do to earn enough money to help my mother and to marry Rachel? The solution to my problem was only days away in the hands of a tough, shrewd, courageous man called Branch Rickey, the president of the Brooklyn Dodgers.

I guess for every driver the aim is to beat their teammate.

You know, I’m just 6’9 and 260. And just so happen to be very good at playing the game of basketball.“

Pop flies, in a sense, are just a diversion for a second baseman. Grounders are his stock trade.

Oh, I can’t play soccer, and I’m not a great swimmer. I won’t drown, but you won’t see me doing laps in a pool.

I really want a movie made on Sachin Tendulkar’s life. That is something I’m looking forward to. There will be so much emotion to that movie.

The best football is always about expression of emotion. Always.

We knew sports was important to us and our family, but there are priorities in life.Obviously, faith is foremost; how we did in school is important. If we didn’t handle that business then there were no privileges.

When did I know I had talent? I think it started when I first started playing sports, organized sports.

I don’t know about the 2026 World Cup. But I would love to see Anirudh Thapa sending a cross to Jhingan and I would love to watch it from the stands.

That’s what you live for as a sportsman. You have to put up a fight.

I hope to play until I’m, like, 38 or something, and that’s a lot of years in the game and a lot of travel and a lot of sacrifice on my family’s part.

At the end of the day, we started playing football because we loved it.

I want kids. I want a soccer team, and I want a husband.

Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.

In India, people are really glued to the Premier League and La Liga.

He that speaks much, is much mistaken.

I failed to make the chess team because of my height.

Once it gets down to single-digit games, you know the season’s end is approaching, and we’re all pretty physically tired.

After the 12th class exam results, I got a call from Mohun Bagan. They saw me at Durand Cup when I was playing for City Club of Delhi. I thought they might want me for SAIL Academy. Never ever I thought Mohun Bagan is calling me for Mohun Bagan!

The nuclear industry has this amazing record, even equipment from generations one and two. But nuclear mishaps tend to come in these big events – Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and now Fukushima – so it’s more visible.

I saw 14 games in two and a half months at Churchill. It was what I really signed for. They were eyeing the championship and also playing the AFC Cup. So I am very thankful for Churchill, the coaching staff and the players.

Some say our national pastime is baseball. Not me. It’s gossip.

All the top players in the world play 45-50-60 games. You need that many games, even the strikers need that many games.

In college, a loss is pretty devastating. That feeling kind of goes away in an 82-game season. You hate to lose, but you also have a lot more games to make up for it.

Football (soccer) is a matter of life and death, except more important.

My priority is cricket. Everything that I get apart from it is a result of the effort on the field. Everything else follows. I am pretty aware of my priorities, and I don’t really focus on things that are not as important to me as cricket.

The biggest thrill a ballplayer can have is when your son takes after you. That happened when my Bobby was in his championship Little League game. He really showed me something. Struck out three times. Made an error that lost the game. Parents were throwing things at our car and swearing at us as we drove off. Gosh, I was proud.

I signed a very modest $3,000 bonus with the Braves in Milwaukee. And my old man didn’t have that kinda money to put out.

It all went wrong with football, the thing I loved most of all, and from there, my life slowly fell apart.

So like any football or basketball coach, you always always believe you’re going to win.

I rate Fabien Barthez and played with two great keepers in Alex Stepney and Harry Gregg.

Even a mistake may turn out to be the one thing necessary to a worthwhile achievement.

Before broadcasting for 50-some years, I did TV, played 10 years in the big leagues, won a world championship – and played a big part in that, too, letting the Cardinals inject me with hepatitis. Takes a big man to do that.

When the NBA adopted their uniform that they had to wear, I thought that was very interesting. And you see the way NBA players dress: It’s very cool.

To be able to finish opportunities that I do get in the paint, that makes a difference.

I get a little bit emotional during a game!

We’re not going to go 82-0 and blow everybody out. We are going to be challenged.

If someone told me I could play two Asian Cup finals, I wouldn’t have believed it.

The old Dodgers were something special, but of my teammates overall, there was nobody like Pee Wee Reese for me.

Talking to a player helps, but in our sport the majority of learning happens from watching another player. You pick up things like being punctual, being nice to everyone, making sure you give your 100 per cent even in training.

My game is really played above time. I don’t say that like I’m saying I’m ahead of my time. I’m saying, like, if I’m on the court and I throw a pass, the ball that I’ve thrown will lead my teammate right where he needs to go, before he even knows that that’s the right place to go to.

Whoever the coach is, my job is to talk to him, understand him and be a better player under him and give my best.

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

When I used to play sports, I’d be the one cheering the team on, ‚Come on, we can beat these guys!‘ That’s just in me.

Cleveland fans are awesome.

March is a month without mercy for rabid basketball fans. There is no such thing as a ‚gentleman gambler‘ when the Big Dance rolls around. All sheep will be fleeced, all fools will be punished severely… There are no Rules when the deal goes down in the final weeks of March. Even your good friends will turn into monsters.