Branch Rickey Quotes

All I had was natural ability.

The man with the ball is responsible for what happens to the ball.

Trade a player a year too early rather than a year too late.

Baseball is a game of inches.

When (Rube) Waddell
had control and some sleep, he was unbeatable.

Worry is simply thinking the same thing over and over again and not doing anything about it.

Don't look at the hole in the doughnut. Look at the whole doughnut.

Branch Rickey made me a better man.

Baseball people, and that includes myself, are slow to change and accept new ideas. I remember that it took years to persuade them to put numbers on uniforms.

Luck is the residue of opportunity and design.

Don't worry about your individual numbers. Worry about the team. If the team is successful, each of you will be successful, too.

Never surrender opportunity for security.

I'm a man of some intelligence. I've had some education, passed the bar, practiced law. I've been a teacher and I deal with men of substance, statesman, business leaders, the clergy ... So why do I spend my time arguing with Dizzy Dean?

He (Leo Durocher) had the ability of taking a bad situation and making it immediately worse.

If things don't come easy, there is no premium on effort. There should be joy in the chase, zest in the pursuit.

Thou shalt not steal. I mean defensively. On offense, indeed thou shall steal and thou must.

Good luck is what is left over after intelligence and effort have combined at their best. Luck is the residue of design.

I cannot face my God much longer knowing that his black creatures are held separate and distinct from his white creatures in the game that has given me all that I can call my own.

Leisure is the handmaiden of the devil.

A game of great charm in the adoption of mathematical measurements to the timing of human movements, the exactitudes and adjustments of physical ability to hazardous chance. The speed of the legs, the dexterity of the body, the grace of the swing, the elusiveness of the slide - these are the features that make Americans everywhere forget the last syllable of a man's last name or the pigmentation of his skin.

Baseball people are generally allergic to new ideas; it took years to persuade them to put numbers on uniforms, and it is the hardest thing in the world to get Major League Baseball to change anything - even spikes on a new pair of shoes - but they will eventually ... they are bound to.

A great ballplayer is a player who will take a chance.

Fill in any figure you want for that boy (Mickey Mantle). Whatever the figure, it's a deal.

A full mind is an empty bat.

I find fault with my children because I like them and I want them to go places - uprightness and strength and courage and civil respect and anything that affects the probabilities of failure on the part of those that are closest to me, that concerns me - I find fault.

The greatest untapped reservoir of raw material in the history of our game is the black race.

I am alarmed at the subtle invasion of professional football, which is gaining preeminence over baseball. It's unthinkable.