Talkin’ Baseball
“When I get through managing I am going to open up a kindergarten.”
Bygone baseball by
C. Philip Francis
The crack of bat and ball is again echoing across the land of cactus and palm trees, but somehow we have made it through those winter days of no baseball. So just in case you may need a little nudge to get back in the proper mood the following baseball talk might help.
--- “The only real game, I think, in the world is baseball.” – Babe Ruth.
--- “There is always some kid who may be seeing me for the first or last time. I owe him my best.” – Joe DiMaggio’s response when asked why he never let up during a game.
--- “Hit ‘em where they ain’t.” – Wee Willie Keeler’s batting strategy.
--- “Eeyah-eeyah.” – The yells from Hughie Jennings that became his trademark.
--- “A good umpire is the umpire you don’t even notice. He’s there all afternoon but when the game is over, you don’t remember his name.” – Ban Johnson, the first American League president.
--- “I can’t tell you who was the best because the others would all get angry and some of them are dead at the present time.” – Casey Stengel when asked to choose the best player he ever saw.
--- “When I get though managing, I’m going to open up a kindergarten.” – Billy Martin, baseball player and manager.
--- “If they worked as hard at their jobs as I do at mine, this country wouldn’t have the inflation problem it now has.” – Mike Marshall, an intellectual relief pitcher in the ‘60’s and ‘70’s, in regards to his negative fans.
--- “Never eat the stuff. Makes your bones soft.” – Reference to salad by Leo Durocher shortly after marriage to Loraine Day.
--- “Putting lights on Wrigley Field is like putting aluminum siding on the Sistine Chapel.” – Columnist Roger Simon.
--- “About this autograph business. Once someone in Washington sent up a picture to me and I wrote, ‘Do good in school.’ I look up, this guy is 78 years old.” – Casey Stengel.
--- “My only regret in life is that I can’t sit in the stands and watch me pitch.” – Bo Belinsky.
--- “No, I feel fine.” – Yogi Berra when asked if he had seen Doctor Zhivago.
--- “ The only mistake I made in my whole baseball career was hitting .361 that one year, because ever since then people have expected me to keep on doing it.” – Norm Cash following his 1961 season.
--- “Fans are the only ones who really care. There are no free-agent fans. There are no fans who say, ‘Get me out of here. I want to root for a winner.’” – Petulant sportswriter Dick Young.
--- “Many baseball fans look upon an umpire as a sort of necessary evil to the luxury of baseball, like the odor that follows an automobile.” – Hall of Fame pitcher Christy Mathewson.
--- “Old Diz knows the King’s English. And not only that I also know the Queen is English.” – Dizzy Dean after told he did not speak the “King’s English.”
--- “Every great batter works on the theory that the pitcher is more afraid of him than he is of the pitcher.” – Hall of Famer hitter and base-stealer Ty Cobb.
--- “A young ballplayer looks on his first spring training trip as a stage-struck young woman regards the theatre. She can think only of the lobster suppers and the applause and the colored lights.” – Christy Mathewson.
--- “You can’t hit what you can’t see.” – Outfielder Ping Bodie of the 1910’s after striking out against Walter Johnson.
--- “It’s the only occupation where a man has to be perfect the first day on the job and then improve over the years.” – Umpire Ed Runge on umpires.
--- “You just have watch your language. You have to turn your four-letter words into five letters.” – Glenn Wilson, player turned broadcaster.
--- “I don’t know what got into that silly honey. Why pick on a nice guy like me?” – a 1949 statement to reporters by player Eddie Waitkus after he was shot by deranged Ruth Ann Steinhagen in a Chicago hotel.
--- “…every member of our baseball team at West Point became a general: this proves the value of team sports for the military.” – Quoted by General Omar Bradley.
--- “By the end of the season, I feel like a used car.” – player Bob Brenly, 1985.
---The funny thing about these uniforms is that you hang them up in the closet and they get smaller and smaller.” – Cardinal All-Star outfielder Curt Flood at the 1989 old-timers game.
--- “Baseball isn’t statistics, it’s Joe DiMaggio rounding second base.” – Writer Jimmy Breslin.
--- “Well, sir, I grew up in Oklahoma and out there, once you start running there ain’t nothin’ to stop you.” – Pepper Martin, passionate and aggressive member of the 1930’s Cardinal Gashouse Gang, to a reporter who asked how he learned to run so well.
--- “It’s a beautiful day for a night game.” – Anon. sportscaster
--- “All I want out of life is that when I walk down the street, folks will say, ‘There is the greatest hitter who ever lived.’” – Hall of Famer Ted Williams.
--- “Baseball is the only thing besides the paper clip what hasn’t changed.” – Legendary maverick team owner Bill Veeck.