Shortstops Quotes

Sometimes a strikeout means that the slugger's girlfriend just ran off with the UPS driver. Sometimes a muffed ground ball means that the shortstop's baby daughter has a pain in her head that won't go away. And handicapping is for amateur golfers, not ballplayers. Pitchers don't ease off on the cleanup hitter because of the lumps just discovered in his wife's breast. Baseball is not life. It is a fiction, a metaphor. And a ballplayer is a man who agrees to uphold that metaphor as though lives were at stake.

Perhaps they are. I cherish a theory I once heard propounded by G.Q. Durham that professional baseball is inherently antiwar. The most overlooked cause of war, his theory runs, is that it's so damned interesting. It takes hard effort, skill, love and a little luck to make times of peace consistently interesting. About all it takes to make war interesting is a life. The appeal of trying to kill others without being killed yourself, according to Gale, is that it brings suspense, terror, honor, disgrace, rage, tragedy, treachery and occasionally even heroism within range of guys who, in times of peace, might lead lives of unmitigated blandness. But baseball, he says, is one activity that is able to generate suspense and excitement on a national scale, just like war. And baseball can only be played in peace. Hence G.Q.'s thesis that pro ball-players - little as some of them may want to hear it - are basically just a bunch of unusually well-coordinated guys working ~ David James Duncan

To reach a ball he has never reached before, to extend himself to the very limits of his range, and then a step farther, this is the shortstop's dream. ~ Chad Harbach

You should have seen Willie Wells play shortstop: as good as Ozzie Smith and a better hitter. How I wish people could have seen Ray Dandridge play third base, as good as Brooks Robinson and Craig Nettles and all of those. He was bowlegged; a train might go through there, but not a baseball. ~ Monte Irvin

If the shortstop makes an error, I am responsible. I let the batter hit the ball. ~ Pedro Martinez

I always wanted to be a shortstop so I could play more often! ~ Jim Abbott

My Daddy was left-handed, and I was left-handed when I was little. In fact, I was left-handed all the way to high school. Then I switched over to right-handed cause I wanted to play shortstop. ~ Luke Appling

You've just got to keep playing hard. You have to remember that you are not just playing for the Twins. There are other teams out there. If anybody needs a shortstop they are going to come knocking on the door. So, you just have to be ready at all times. ~ Jason Bartlett

I was a pitcher, shortstop and outfielder, and the Yankees tried to sign me out of high school as a first-round draft pick in 1981. I turned them down to go to college. ~ Bo Jackson

You are recognized by your bat. If you are the best hitting shortstop out there, that's how you win a Gold Glove. That's the way it is. It shouldn't be-it's a defensive award. ~ Jimmy Rollins

If Albert Einstein was right, Cal Ripken should have been a CEO or politician rather than a shortstop, because Ripken led by example over and over ... and over again. ~ Don Yaeger

Good stockbrokers are a dime a dozen, but good shortstops are hard to find. ~ Charlie Finley

There was a time when rival teams used a shift against me. They would put the second baseman on the shortstop's side of the bag, move the shortstop into the hole to his right, and have the third baseman hug the foul line. The idea was to build an infield wall against a known right-handed pull hitter. ~ Harmon Killebrew

You learn from music, from watching great athletes at work - how disciplined they are, how they move. You learn these things by watching a shortstop at work, how he concentrates on one thing at a time. You learn from classic music, from the blues and jazz, from bluegrass. From all this, you learn how to sustain a great line without bringing in unnecessary words. ~ Ernest Gaines

I never wanted to be a dancer. It's true! I wanted to be a shortstop for the Pittsburgh Pirates. ~ Gene Kelly

Japan has one of them crazy robot shortstops, ~ Curtis Granderson

I just wanted to be like my dad, Jesus. He was a good shortstop. ~ Johan Santana

All that analysis is well and good, but what I need right now is a left-handed batter who can hit the ball over the shortstop's head. ~ Casey Stengel