Some people are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple.

If you drink don't drive. Don't even putt.

Golf is a day spent in a round of strenuous idleness.

Pitching is the art of instilling fear.

Champions keep playing until they get it right.

You always get a special kick on opening day, no matter how many you go through. You look forward to it like a birthday party when you're a kid. You think something wonderful is going to happen.

To me, it doesn't matter how good you are. Sport is all about playing and competing. Whatever you do in cricket and in sport, enjoy it, be positive and try to win.

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.

Any time Detroit scores more than 100 points and holds the other team below 100 points they almost always win.

I always turn to the sports pages first, which records people's accomplishments. The front page has nothing but man's failures.

Reverse every natural instinct and do the opposite of what you are inclined to do, and you will probably come very close to having a perfect golf swing.

One man practicing sportsmanship is far better than a hundred teaching it.

Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they've got a second.

Sometimes in football you have to score goals.

The trouble with jogging is that the ice falls out of your glass.

Finding good players is easy. Getting them to play as a team is another story.

Just be patient. Let the game come to you. Don't rush. Be quick, but don't hurry.

If you think it's hard to meet new people, try picking up the wrong golf ball.

Academe, n.: An ancient school where morality and philosophy were taught. Academy, n.: A modern school where football is taught.

Tennis is a perfect combination of violent action taking place in an atmosphere of total tranquillity.

Baseball is the only field of endeavor where a man can succeed three times out of ten and be considered a good performer.

Approach the game with no preset agendas and you'll probably come away surprised at your overall efforts.

In football, time and space are the same thing.

It's just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.

New Yorkers love it when you spill your guts out there. Spill your guts at Wimbledon and they make you stop and clean it up.

Basketball is like war in that offensive weapons are developed first, and it always takes a while for the defense to catch up.

Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.

You can't put a limit on anything. The more you dream, the farther you get.

Sports do not build character. They reveal it.

Show me a good loser, and I'll show you a loser.

Bulls do not win bull fights. People do.

You know it's going to hell when the best rapper out there is white and the best golfer is black.

All sports for all people.

I'm tired of hearing about money, money, money, money, money. I just want to play the game, drink Pepsi, wear Reebok.

Gold medals aren't really made of gold. They're made of sweat, determination, and a hard-to-find alloy called guts.

You spend a good piece of your life gripping a baseball and in the end it turns out that it was the other way around all the time.

Life is about timing.

When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.

You win some, lose some, and wreck some.

God made me fast. And when I run, I feel His pleasure.

I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.

Hitting is timing. Pitching is upsetting timing.

He has the finest, fundamentally sound golf swing I've ever seen.

Success is where preparation and opportunity meet.

Trying to sneak a fastball past Hank Aaron is like trying to sneak the sunrise past a rooster.

Golf is a game in which you yell 'fore,' shoot six, and write down five.

The only way to prove that you're a good sport is to lose.

I'm a competitive person and I love the challenge of mastering new things.

I guess there is nothing that will get your mind off everything like golf. I have never been depressed enough to take up the game, but they say you get so sore at yourself you forget to hate your enemies.

Nobody roots for Goliath.

Adversity causes some men to break; others to break records.

I am building a fire, and everyday I train, I add more fuel. At just the right moment, I light the match.

You can't win unless you learn how to lose.

All hockey players are bilingual. They know English and profanity.

Nobody's a natural. You work hard to get good and then work to get better. It's hard to stay on top.

I see great things in baseball. It's our game - the American game.

Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after.

People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring.

I know I am getting better at golf because I am hitting fewer spectators.

The game of basketball has been everything to me. My place of refuge, place I've always gone where I needed comfort and peace. It's been the site of intense pain and the most intense feelings of joy and satisfaction. It's a relationship that has evolved over time, given me the greatest respect and love for the game.

You don't play against opponents, you play against the game of basketball.

I'd just as soon play tennis with the net down.

If you watch a game, it's fun. If you play it, it's recreation. If you work at it, it's golf.

Golf is a good walk spoiled.

Baseball happens to be a game of cumulative tension but football, basketball and hockey are played with hand grenades and machine guns.

To find a man's true character, play golf with him.

Football is a simple game. Twenty-two men chase a ball for 90 minutes and at the end, the Germans always win.

I started playing ball when I was a kid. My dad was a pro ball player and he passed on his knowledge to me.

We didn't lose the game; we just ran out of time.

If a tie is like kissing your sister, losing is like kissing you grandmother with her teeth out.

Pro football is like nuclear warfare. There are no winners, only survivors.

I had my boy in Boston on Easter Sunday. That kills me, from a sports perspective. He's a Boston baby and I'm a New York guy.

I'll let the racket do the talking.

If a man watches three football games in a row, he should be declared legally dead.

When I was 40, my doctor advised me that a man in his 40s shouldn't play tennis. I heeded his advice carefully and could hardly wait until I reached 50 to start again.

I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.

Fishing is much more than fish. It is the great occasion when we may return to the fine simplicity of our forefathers.

Football is violence and cold weather and sex and college rye.

I regard golf as an expensive way of playing marbles.

Just play. Have fun. Enjoy the game.

Golf is a game in which one endeavors to control a ball with implements ill adapted for the purpose.

Football is football and talent is talent. But the mindset of your team makes all the difference.

My motto was always to keep swinging. Whether I was in a slump or feeling badly or having trouble off the field, the only thing to do was keep swinging.

Half the lies they tell about me aren't true.

I went to a fight the other night, and a hockey game broke out.

Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.

The game of golf would lose a great deal if croquet mallets and billiard cues were allowed on the putting green.

You can make a lot of money in this game. Just ask my ex-wives. Both of them are so rich that neither of their husbands work.

I want to rip out his heart and feed it to Lennox Lewis. I want to kill people. I want to rip their stomachs out and eat their children.

The way a team plays as a whole determines its success. You may have the greatest bunch of individual stars in the world, but if they don't play together, the club won't be worth a dime.

Give me golf clubs, fresh air and a beautiful partner, and you can keep the clubs and the fresh air.

Fans don't boo nobodies.

Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play.

The two most important things in life are good friends and a strong bullpen.

Bobby Knight told me this: 'There is nothing that a good defense cannot beat a better offense.' In other words a good offense wins.

Don't look back. Something might be gaining on you.

The difference in golf and government is that in golf you can't improve your lie.

Skiing combines outdoor fun with knocking down trees with your face.

What other people may find in poetry or art museums, I find in the flight of a good drive.

A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.