A few quotes to get us in the mood - Baseball 2013

 Some of the best things said by baseball people – Part 1

This is the last pure place where Americans dream. This is the last great arena, the last green arena, where everybody can learn lessons of life.
                            ...(Marcus Giamatti partially quoting his father, Bart Giamatti).

 Since baseball time is measured only in outs, all you have to do is keep hitting, keep the rally alive, and you have defeated time. You remain forever young.

                           ...Roger Angell

It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone.
                           ...A. Bartlett Giamatti

Luck is the residue of design.
                           ...Branch Rickey

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

There ain’t nothing to being a ballplayer – if you’re a ballplayer.

                            …Honus Wagner

He couldn’t hit a bull in the ass with a banjo.

            …Ted Kleinhans, former Syracuse University baseball coach

Baseball, it is said, is only a game. True. And the Grand Canyon is only a hole in Arizona.
                        … George Will

Marilyn Monroe, returning from a USO tour in Korea, to her husband, Joe DiMaggio:

 Joe, you’ve  never heard such cheering.

Joe D.: Yes I have.

The secret of successful managing is to keep the five guys who hate you away from the four guys who haven't made up their minds.

                            …Casey Stengel.

If there's a foul ball behind third base, it's the shortstop's play!

             …Peppermint Patty

I'm throwing as hard as I ever did, but the ball is just not getting there as fast.

                        …Lefty Gomez

MICKEY MANTLE
A GREAT TEAMMATE
1931-1996
536 HOME RUNS
WINNER OF THE TRIPLE CROWN 1956
MOST WORLD SERIES HOMERS 18
SELECTED TO ALLSTAR GAME 20 TIMES
WON MVP AWARD 1956, 1957 & 1962
WHO LEFT A LEGACY OF
UNEQUALLED COURAGE

DEDICATED BY THE NEW YORK YANKEES
AUGUST 24, 1996

                        The Mick’s plaque at Yankee Stadium