Greatest Basketball Quotes & Sayings

The greatest strength any human being an have is to recognize his or her own weaknesses. When you identify your weaknesses, you can begin to remedy them - or at least figure out how to work around them. — Pat Summitt

There is no such thing as a perfect basketball player, and I don't believe there is only one greatest player either. — Michael Jordan

I found the bench to be the greatest ally when I had to make individuals comply with what was best for the team — John Wooden

Now tell me this. What would you consider the greatest spectator sport in the country today? Would you say it was baseball, basketball, football? ... It's politics. That's right, politics. Millions and millions of people following it every day in the newspapers, over the TV and the radio. Now mind you, they wouldn't get mixed up in this themselves for all the tea in China, but they know the names and numbers of all the players. And what they can't tell the coaches about strategy. Oh, you should see some of the letters I get. — Frank Nugent

If you told me two years I would miss the greatest basketball game ever to hang out with Nathan Lane, I'd say, 'You're crazy!' — Chris Rock

Basketball was always a game to me. One of the greatest things in life for me was to be able to play what I loved dearly and get paid for it. So it was always a game to me and that's how I perceived everything. — Larry Bird

Even the greatest players accept coaching and value the need for discipline and the order that it brings to the team — Jack Ramsay

When your teammate looks you in the eye and holds you accountable, that's the greatest kind of leadership there is — Doug Collins

What I know is that if you're going to play half-court, you'd better have the greatest executioners of half-court basketball. If you run, you test the stamina and willpower of the other team. That's what I learned as a player. — Tom Heinsohn

The greatest sin a coach can commit is to allow kids to slide by. This goes for the classroom as well as the court — Hubie Brown

The greatest compliment to any player is he is a great teammate. We can't all be great players, but we can all be great teammates — Jay Bilas

Discipline is the greatest form of love you can show someone. Great players crave discipline — Tom Izzo

The greatest ally you have to get things working well and the players performing as a team is the bench. Don't be afraid to use it, either for the star player or anyone else. — John Wooden

I think that David Stern is probably the greatest commissioner that any sport has ever had in the history of this country. — Bill Russell

I believe that if I committed to basketball, I could make an impact in the NBA. I now see football as my job and my greatest challenge. — Julius Peppers

As I look back on the day I signed my professional contract in 1973, I've never gone to sleep wondering if I could pay the bills or take care of my family. That's what basketball has done for me. It's given me the greatest of thrills from high school to college to the Olympics to coaching to broadcasting. — Doug Collins

We cut him off and there was nowhere for him to go but out of bounds ... It's still the greatest move I've ever seen in basketball, the all-time greatest. — Magic Johnson

Earl "The Goat" Manigault was probably the greatest basketball player of all time, but Michael Jordan is universally regarded as the best ever. This is because The Goat only did it at Rucker Park, while Michael did it where it mattered: in front of the world. — Tucker Max

Many of the most successful coaches and managers have come from players who never reached the highest level. The one exception seems to be basketball, where many of the greatest stars at least tried to coach a team. — George Vecsey

No matter how hard you work at your craft and no matter how successful you become, people just have to find something negative to hang on you. You can be the greatest ever at what you do, and people will still turn on you. Even with all the championships Michael Jordan has won, people say, "Well, he's a great basketball player but he's not socially conscious." The bar is always being raised as you go. The rules are always being rewritten. There's aggravation that comes with that, but that's part of what makes triupmh so swett. — Charles Barkley

The greatest words you hear in college basketball are Ohio State advances. (The Iowa upset) is amazing. But again, it's all the proof you need that there's no guarantee. — Thad Matta

My greatest gift that I have in life is basketball. — Isaiah Thomas

People say it was the greatest individual rivalry they've ever seen. I agree with that. Let me assure you that if either Wilt's or Russ' coach had ever told one of them he couldn't guard the other guy, he would have lost that player forever. — Bill Russell

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. — Michael Jordan

The 1992 US Olympic basketball team is the best sports team ever, the equivalent of rounding up the greatest American writers of the last century or so and watching them collaborate: 'OK, Twain, you do the dialogue and hand off to Faulkner. He'll do the interior monologue. Hemingway will edit - no, don't make that face, you know you overwrite. And be nice to Cheever. He's young, but he's got a good ear. Wharton and Cather can't play - they're girls.' — Anna Quindlen

I think the greatest all-around athlete ever was Jim Brown. He played lacrosse, basketball and ran track at Syracuse. He played professional football for the Browns. — Will McDonough

If basketball was going to enable Bradley to make friends, to prove that a banker's son is as good as the next fellow, to prove that he could do without being the greatest-end-ever at Missouri, to prove that he was not chicken, and to live up to his mother's championship standards, and if he was going to have some moments left over to savor his delight in the game, he obviously needed considerable practice, so he borrowed keys to the gym and set a schedule for himself that he adhereded to for four full years - in the school year, three and a half hours every day after school, nine to five on Saturday, one-thirty to five on Sunday, and, in the summer, about three hours a day. — John McPhee

I played when I played, and played, I think, against the greatest players in the greatest time in the history of basketball. — Oscar Robertson

Sometimes a player's greatest challenge is coming to grips with his role on the team. — Scottie Pippen

Indeed, the maligned American pastime of baseball may be by-far the greatest and best sport by one criterion, when it comes to emulating and training for genuinely useful Neolithic skills! Think about it. The game consists of lots of patient waiting and watching (stalking), throwing with incredible accuracy and speed, sprinting, dodging ... and hitting moving objects real hard with clubs! And arguing. Hey, what else could you possibly need? Now, tell me, how do soccer or basketball prepare you to survive in the wild, hm? — David Brin

In basketball, you can be the greatest individual player in the world and still lose every game, because a team will always beat an individual. — Bill Walton

I wasn't a bad basketball player, but I was far from the world's greatest. Good defense, no offense - that was me. — Chuck Connors