- If I had known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.
- I had it all and blew it.
- (About hitting a home run hungover) If you thought hitting that home run was hard, you should have seen me trying to run the bases!
- During my 18 years I came to bat almost 10,000 times. I struck out about 1,700 times and walked maybe 1,800 times. You figure a ballplayer will average about 500 at-bats a season. That means I played 7 years without ever hitting the ball.
- You don't realize how easy this game is until you get up in that broadcasting booth.
- Sometimes I think if I had the same body and the same natural ability and someone else's brain, who knows how good a player I might have been.
- Sometimes I sit in my den at home and read stories about myself. Kids used to save whole scrapbooks on me. They get tired of them and mail them to me. I'll go in there and read them, and you know what? They might as well be about Musial and DiMaggio, it's like reading about somebody else.
- My dad taught me to switch-hit. He and my grandfather, who was left-handed, pitched to me everyday after school in the back yard. I batted lefty against my dad and righty against my granddad.
- It's unbelievable how much you don't know about the game you've been playing all your life.
- I hated to bat against Drysdale. After he hit you he'd come around, look at the bruise on your arm and say, 'Do you want me to sign it?'
- I'll play baseball for the Army or fight for it, whatever they want me to do.
- I always loved the game, but when my legs weren't hurting it was a lot easier to love.
- Hitting the ball was easy. Running around the bases was the tough part.
- A team is where a boy can prove his courage on his own. A gang is where a coward goes to hide.
- All the ballparks and the big crowds have a certain mystique. You feel attached, permanently wedded to the sounds that ring out, to the fans chanting your name, even when there are only four or five thousand in the stands on a Wednesday afternoon.
- If I had played my career hitting singles like Pete [Rose], I'd wear a dress.
- After I hit a home run I had a habit of running the bases with my head down. I figured the pitcher already felt bad enough without me showing him up rounding the bases.
- I couldn't do anything wrong after Roger beat me. I became the underdog; they hated him and liked me. Everywhere I went I got standing ovations. It was a lot better than having them boo you. - on the 1961 record chase with Roger Maris
- The only sure rule of golf is - he who has the fastest cart never has to play the bad lie.
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