Players Its Quotes & Sayings

Since there are always talented players in these emerging categories, no matter how grating they may be to the ear of the more traditionally inclined, I was not surprised when the heavy metal band Metallica achieved a style that was huge and orchestral in its guitar textures, showing itself to be perfectly capable of producing beautiful melodies with unusual, finely constructed harmonies. — Linda Ronstadt

The very first hit factory was T.B. Harms, a Tin Pan Alley publishing company overseen by Max Dreyfus. With staff writers like Jerome Kern, George and Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter, and Richard Rodgers, T.B. Harms was the dominant publisher of popular music in the early twentieth century. Dreyfus called his writers "the boys" and installed pianos for them to compose on around the office on West Twenty-Eighth, the street that gave Tin Pan Alley its name, allegedly for the tinny-sounding pianos passersby heard from the upper-story windows of the row houses. The sheet-music sellers also employed piano players in their street-level stores, who would perform the Top 40 of the 1920s for browsing customers. — John Seabrook

Our goal as a team is to keep playing as a group for as long as we can because you will never have that team again. It is like a dying limb, you have to prune it off and let another one grow in its place. That is the way you have to do it, but it still hurts losing these guys and that team because they and you have put so much effort into building a team. Even if you win that last game (and a national championship), it hurts badly because the players know they will never have that same special group of guys together on the same team again. Somebody always goes and somebody new always comes in. — Don Meyer

How I hate the Beautiful Game! I hate its cry-baby players and its gruff, joyless managers, its blokish supporters and its sinister owners, its whistle-peeping referees and its chippy little linesmen, its excitable commentators and - perhaps most of all - its unpluggable 'analysts.' — Craig Brown

But before Derby go, would they mind telling the rest of the Premier League - the league which it has debased with its pathetically-inadequate presence for the past 12 months - where the money has gone? You know, the £30m or so in prize money that every team, even the one at the bottom of the table from August to May, automatically receives by being in the Premier League ... So what happened to that money? Or put another way, why was such a meaningless fraction of it spent on recruiting new players? It's one thing not to compete; it's quite another not to even attempt to do so. — Pete Gill

Leaning over the bright display among the back aisles of a forbidden arcade, rows of other players silent, unnoticed, closing time never announced, playing for nothing but the score itself, the row of numbers, a chance of entering her initials among those of other strangers for a brief time, no longer the time the world observed but game time, underground time, time that could take her nowhere outside its own tight and falsely deathless perimeter. — Thomas Pynchon

Oh, 'twould be marvelous if the world and its moral questions were like some game board, with plain black players and white, and fixed rules, and nary a shade of grey. — Glen Cook

To represent the United States in international competition is special recognition that not many players receive and I am really looking forward to helping USA Basketball regain its status in international basketball. — Jermaine O'Neal

He had given himself over to endless wanderings, a life of migration from life-to-life, albeit not necessarily a set of migrations one must view as physical, but rather a set of migrations between circumstances, a set of migrations where the players surrounding him were just as likely to move as he, but nonetheless, a set of migrations calling forth a life unalterable only by its lack of permanence. Along with this came the slow, but dawning realization that he had relinquished his claim over those new memories he could have created alongside the friends and relatives closest to him; and that he had, furthermore, ceased to exist in such people's minds, except as a faint and indistinct silhouette of what he had once been, situated seamlessly against the vivid and oddly memorable backdrops of spaces and moments which shall never be again. — Ashim Shanker

Bodies like this give sexual desire its meaning! It's for this that penises rise like drawbridges and vaginas become engorged with blood! It's for this that people throw snot-nosed kids into ravines, cross raging rivers, or ice-pick up the wrong side of frozen waterfalls! It's for this that politicians undo their flies in election season, porn magazines with their pages stuck together are found stacked in church basements, people chop off body parts and mail them to ex-lovers, risk hair on palms, stolen wallets, planes flying into buildings, and lice that hop like chess figurines on a board whose players are ever changing. — Barry Webster

The casino played a song of its own - slot machines dinging, chips clacking as the dealer passed them out to the players at the tables, and the chatter of people throwing down money with the hope of hitting it big. It was like a carnival for adults. A person could get lost for days in a place like this. — Michelle Madow

I've been around enough to know what it takes to get a team to reach its potential, and I want players who want to reach their potential. — Bill Parcells

I sometimes rented a car and drove from event to event in Europe; a road trip was a great escape from the day-to-day anxieties of playing, and it kept me from getting too lost in the tournament fun house with its courtesy cars, caterers, locker room attendants, and such - all amenities that create a firewall between players and what you might call the 'real' world - you know, where you may have to read a map, ask a question in a foreign tongue, find a restaurant and read the menu posted in the window to make sure you're not about to walk into a joint that serves only exotic reptile meat. — Patrick McEnroe

However good an English team is, they will always have an additional advantage. It is that European players know that their English opponents will come at them in the belief they will win, and they can always be guaranteed never to stop fighting. They have a natural aggression that they are born with. If it ever goes, English football will lose its most valuable dimension. — Johan Cruijff

By obtaining a sense of its place in the unfolding drama of life, set in an ecological theatre, so we can understand why it has become one of the leading players. — Simon Conway Morris

It was the pivotal teaching of Pluthero Quexos, the most celebrated dramatist of the Second Dominion, that in any fiction, no matter how ambitious its scope or profound its theme, there was only ever room for three players. Between warring kings, a peacemaker; between adoring spouses, a seducer or a child. Between twins, the spirit of the womb. Between lovers, Death. Greater numbers might drift through the drama, of course
thousands in fact
but they could only ever be phantoms, agents, or, on rare occasions, reflections of the three real and self-willed beings who stood at the center. And even this essential trio would not remain intact; or so he taught. It would steadily diminish as the story unfolded, three becoming two, two becoming one, until the stage was left deserted. — Clive Barker

There's no way out," he announced with satisfaction, "and no amount of wishful dreaming will produce one. The demon won't go back in its bottle, the face-off is for ever, the embrace gets tighter and the toys cleverer with every generation, and there's no such thing for either side as enough security. Not for the main players, not for the nasty little newcomers who each year run themselves up a suitcase bomb and join the club. We get tired of believing that, because we're human. We may even con ourselves into believing the threat has gone away. It never will. Never, never, never."
"So, who'll save us then, Walt?" Barley asked. "You and Nedsky?"
"Vanity, if anything will, which I doubt," Walter retorted. "No leader wants to go down in history as the ass who destroyed his country in an afternoon. And funk, I suppose. Most of our gallant politicians do have a narcissistic objection to suicide, thank God. — John Le Carre

Its a real honor to be included among the list of finalists, when you see the names that are there, ... Some of the guys who won the Hank Aaron Award in the past are thought of as some of the best players in the history of the game, so just to be included with those guys is really gratifying. — Mark Teixeira

I feel that the All-Star game is more like a party because its made up of a lot of elements. However the core of All-Star is still the 48 minute-game and all the fans will pay all attention to the showcase of the players excellent skills. The result of the game is not much of a concern. — Yao Ming

All chess players know what a combination is. Whether one makes it oneself, or is its victim, or reads of it, it stands out from the rest of the game and stirs one's admiration. — Eugene Znosko-Borovsky

There cannot be enduring peace, prosperity, equality and brotherhood in this world if our aims are so separate and divergent, if we do not accept that in the end we are people, all alike, sharing the Earth among ourselves and also with other sentient beings, all of whom have an equal role and stake in the state of this planet and its players. — Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck

A world where players have enough power to block everyone else's initiatives but no one has the power to impose its preferred course of action is a world where decisions are not taken, taken too late, or watered down to the point of ineffectiveness. Without — Moises Naim

So also in culture. Infinite players understand that the vigor of a culture has to do with the variety of its sources, the differences within itself. The unique and the surprising are not suppressed in some persons for the strength of others. The genius in you stimulates the genius in me. — James P. Carse

Chess is the only game greater than its players. — Tim Rice

The poet Melvin B. Tolson once said, 'A civilization is judged only in its decline.' That made sense to me. I would imagine the same is true for poets and tennis players. — Nikki Giovanni

Human affairs are like a chess-game: only those who do not take it seriously can be called good players. Life is like an earthen pot: only when it is shattered, does it manifest its emptiness. — Seneca The Younger

Collective impact (fig. 3.8) operates on the premise that much of conservation and donor funding has fallen short of meeting its goals of significant societal transformation because decision and implementation programs are too fractured and diffuse, generating competition among players rather than collaboration in what is often a zero-sum game. — Charles G. Curtin

The living cell is the most complex system of its size known to mankind. Its host of specialized molecules, many found nowhere else but within living material, are themselves already enormously complex. They execute a dance of exquisite fidelity, orchestrated with breathtaking precision. Vastly more elaborate than the most complicated ballet, the dance of life encompasses countless molecular performers in synergetic coordination. Yet this is a dance with no sign of a choreographer. No intelligent supervisor, no mystic force, no conscious controlling agency swings the molecules into place at the right time, chooses the appropriate players, closes the links, uncouples the partners, moves them on. The dance of life is spontaneous, self-sustaining, and self-creating. — Paul Davies

Computer and video games represent one of the most important new media developments of this generation. Unlike many other forms of entertainment they offer players the opportunity to explore, be creative, learn through interaction and express themselves to others. It is vitally important that we protect and nurture this new art form so that it can reach its full potential. Like most new forms of artistic expression that have come before (music, novels, movies), the primary critics of video games are the people that do not play them. — Will Wright

All players have 'ordinary' periods in their career and it's hard to explain why. So at these times, its all about self belief, hard work and hopefully you get the break and your form returns. — Ryan Giggs

Insects are major players in nature's recycling effort, and in nature a corpse is simply organic matter to be recycled. Left to its own devices, nature quickly populates a corpse with a diverse community of organisms, all dedicated to reducing the body to its basic components. — M. Lee Goff

Reminiscing No one knows ... until you live it, to be there, to tee it up each week, to get yourself ready, the players and whatever else ... I think its a very, very difficult, tough and demanding job. And to be able to, particularly, stay at the level of expertise that we have over the years. Along with the fact that we have made football a presence at BYU. I think those are the things that are about as satisfying as anything that has happened. Then, of course, the players ... I think the thing that will be the most difficult is leaving the relationships and the involvement. — LaVell Edwards

Brant had said my embellishing constituted a disservice to history and its players. But I believed the opposite. Marooning them on the forlorn island of Only What We Know, a place whose boundaries were determined by the scant information provided by a handful of surviving documents, seemed the greater disservice. I paid homage with my imagination, and hoped I might get visitors to do the same. — Leah Hager Cohen

India buzzes for its players and that makes you feel special. — Kevin Pietersen

Poetry is music though, unfortunately, not all music is poetry. Because music has other carriers to take its message - beats, lyrics, singers, bass players - anyone in music can rise to make a major statement but in poetry there are only words to do the work. And they do sometimes have to sweat. — Nikki Giovanni

Opentoe College had some sort of evangelical mission that involved perpetual kindness and hopelessly outdated uniforms. The Harpooners hated them for it. It was unspeakably infuriating that the one school in the UMSCAC that spent less money on its baseball program than Westish always managed to kick their ass. The Opentoe players never talked even the mildest forms of smack. If you worked a walk, the first baseman would say, "Good eye." If you ripped a three-run triple, the third baseman would say, "Nice rip." They smiled when they were behind, and when they were ahead they looked pensive and slightly sad. Their team name was the Holy Poets. — Chad Harbach

A band's only unique thing is its chemistry, especially if none of you are prodigious players or particularly handsome. The one thing you have is your uniqueness, so we hold on to that. — Chris Martin

You see, a laurel needs rain to grow. I can't do much about that. But I can keep that rain off a few musician's heads, can't I?" A sly smile wound its way onto his face. "So God will tend the laurels and keep them wet. And I will tend the players and keep them dry. And wiser minds than mine will decide when to bring the two together. — Patrick Rothfuss

The myth stems from the belief that writing is some mystical process. That it's magical. That it abides by its own set of rules different from all other forms of work, art, or play.But that's bullshit. Plumbers don't get plumber's block. Teachers don't get teacher's block. Soccer players don't get soccer block. What makes writing different? Nothing. The only difference is that writers feel they have a free pass to give up when writing is hard. — Patrick Rothfuss

The players are connected. Each player, interpreting the music individually, constantly modulates and is modulated by the others. There is no final or "master" interpretation; the music is collectively created, and every performance is unique. This is Edelman's picture of the brain, as an orchestra, an ensemble, but without a conductor, an orchestra which makes its own music. — Oliver Sacks

A team will take on its manager's personality. If it's a laid back manager, you'll have a laid back personality. The players will see that if it's OK for the Manager to be laid back, then you'll have a laid back team. — Pete Rose

Those Panthers ... those itsy, bitsy football players ... those hearty, gutsy guys from the oilfields ... what about 'em? Yep, its incredible, amazin' and unbelievable, but the li'lfellers do occasionally catch the best end of the stick. All the reasons for the phenomenal support of Permian had been embodied by this 1980 varsity team. They were a classic bunch of overachievers who had become living proof of all the perceived values of white working-class and middle-class America-desire, self-sacrifice, pushing oneself beyond the expected limit. They were the kinds of values that the Permian fans harbored about themselves. What made those boys great on the football field had made the fans great as well. Just as the boys had produced against all odds, so they had produced in the oil field against all odds, not with brains and fancy talk but with brawn and muscle and endurance and self-sacrifice. — H. G. Bissinger

But despite its shared nature, language is also dangerous, a potentially isolating enterprise. Not all players are equal. In fact, Wittgenstein was by no means always a successful participant himself, frequently experiencing extreme difficulty in communication and expression. In an essay on fear and public language, the critic Rei Terada describes a scene repeated throughout Wittgenstein's life, in which he would begin to stammer while attempting to address a group of colleagues. Eventually, his stuttering would give way to a tense silence, during which he would struggle mutely with his thoughts, gesticulating all the while with his hands, as if he was still speaking audibly. — Olivia Laing

In the first Test of the 1938 Ashes series, Eddie Paynter and Stan McCabe became the first players on opposing sides to score double-centuries in the same match. Bill Brown and Wally Hammond repeated the feat in the very next Test at Lord's. How quickly the once-unprecedented accumulates its precedents. — Rodney Ulyate

Captivated by its discipline, humanity forgets and goes on forgetting that it is the discipline of chess players, not of angels. — Jorge Luis Borges

A barber is by nature and inclination a sport. He can tell you at what exact hour the ball game is to begin, can foretell its issue without losing a stroke of the razor, and can explain the points of inferiority of all the players, as compared with the better men that he has personally seen elsewhere, with the nicety of a professional. — Stephen Leacock

Of what I know of life, in any moment, you run three vital risks-the risk of being yourself, the risk of not being yourself and the risk
itself. I would stress most on the third kind. It is the game itself that draws its modest players inward. The "risk" to hide out in a world where masks are normative, the "risk" to play the oppressor, the
"risk" to risk your truth one more day in life, the "risk" to not risk your lie. — Simran Keshwani

Baseball also has statistical rigor. Its gurus have an immense data set at hand, almost all of it directly related to the performance of players in the game. Moreover, their data is highly relevant to the outcomes they are trying to predict. This may sound obvious, but as we'll see throughout this book, the folks building WMDs routinely lack data for the behaviors they're most interested in. So they substitute stand-in data, or proxies. They draw statistical correlations between a person's zip code or language patterns and her potential to pay back a loan or handle a job. These correlations are discriminatory, and some of them are illegal. — Cathy O'Neil

My overall point is that 'one and dones' are not healthy for college basketball. I should not have made it personal to Kentucky and its players and I apologize. — Bobby Knight

When we try to establish justice apart from worship of the true God, at best we will, as Jayakumar reminded me, simply replace one set of god players with another. What will never be addressed by these thin, secular conceptions of justice is the heart of the biblical understanding of justice: the restoration of the human capacity to bear the image in all its fullness. — Andy Crouch

Yesterday the DEA raided several NFL teams suspected of giving prescription painkillers to their players. In its defense, the New York Jets' doctor said, 'We don't give painkillers to our players. We give them to our fans.' — Conan O'Brien

I don't wish to denigrate a sport that is enjoyed by millions, some of them awake and facing the right way, but it is an odd game. It is the only sport that incorporates meal breaks. It is the only sport that shares its name with an insect. It is the only sport in which spectators burn as many calories as players - more if they are moderately restless. It is the only competitive activity of any type, other than perhaps baking, in which you can dress in white from head to toe and be as clean at the end of the day as you were at the beginning. — Bill Bryson

For the players to put their minds and vigour into the game is not enough for victory. They must also put in their souls. The team that gives up to the game all its strengths and puts into it its mind and soul cannot leave the court defeated. — Viacheslav Platonov

Golf requires only a few simple Rules and Regulations to guide the players in the true nature of its sporting appeal. The spirit of the game is its own referee. — Robert Harris

RFID is going to get its technical embedding time it needs as serious players are not going to get involved on a sufficient scale with something that might not work. — Mike Marsh

It is important to us to understand and discuss a "vision" with both leagues and then sponsor the league that best matches our views and direction on growing the sport. To do that, there must be a tie back to our grass roots efforts. In short, our marketing plan for new players has to ultimately point to a league and its players. — John Robinson

A team doesn't win the championship if its players are working from different agendas. — John C. Maxwell

When you lay down a proposition which is forthwith controverted, it is of course optional with you to take up the cudgels in its defence. If you are deeply convinced of its truth, you will perhaps be content to leave it to take care of itself; or, at all events, you will not go out of your way to push its fortunes; for you will reflect that in the long run an opinion often borrows credit from the forbearance of its patrons. In the long run, we say; it will meanwhile cost you an occasional pang to see your cherished theory turned into a football by the critics. A football is not, as such, a very respectable object, and the more numerous the players, the more ridiculous it becomes. Unless, therefore, you are very confident of your ability to rescue it from the chaos of kicks, you will best consult its interests by not mingling in the game. — Henry James

Philadelphia loves its team, and being able to win a World Series for the city, fans, players and our Phillies organization meant so much to me. — Pat Gillick

Every generation has their own great players. Who's to say that anyone's better than Cheryl Miller or Nancy Lieberman? Whose anyone to say Michael Jordan is better than Oscar Robertson or Magic Johnson or Larry Bird? Every generation has its great player. There's never going to be one player that's so above and beyond anyone else. — Diana Taurasi

Nobody seems to appreciate what an incredible player Wilt was," Russell said at 1997 All-Star Game when the league named and honored its 50 greatest players. "He was the best player of all time because he dominated the floor like nobody else ever could. To be that big and that athletic was special. — Wilt Chamberlain

It is not true that the English invented cricket as a way of making all other human endeavors look interesting and lively; that was merely an unintended side effect ... It is the only sport that incorporates meal breaks. It is the only sport that shares its name with an insect. It is the only sport in which spectators burn as many calories as the players-more if they are moderately restless. — Bill Bryson

than those who are less skilled. The most critical information comes from the bowling hand and its relationship to the bowling arm after front foot contact has occurred. Abernethy is of the view that anticipatory skill develops slowly and requires extensive exposure to adult movement patterns.
Retrospective studies of successful batsmen frequently reveal that these players have experienced large amounts of unstructured practice during their developing years (especially informal activities such as backyard cricket) and have had early exposure to playing against adults. The latter may be important not only in providing early opportunities to start learning the features — Cricket Australia

Those who attack the rationale of the game, and not the players, are its most formidable adversaries. — James J. Martin

It's not uncommon in the entertainment world for agents to sign young talent. It's sinful that these players can't be represented by lawyers and agents when they're in school. If a player wants to hire someone to seek his value - in any other walk of life, except where this farcical entity that is the NCAA is involved - having a lawyer or agent isn't illegal. It's just the NCAA imposing its own set of rules. It's selfish on their part. — Sonny Vaccaro

Good attitudes among players do not guarantee a team's success, but bad attitudes guarantee its failure. — John C. Maxwell

More than any other games, baseball gives its players space - both physical and emotional - in which to define themselves. — John Eskow

Absurdly, I haven't yet got around to saying that football is a wonderful sport, but of course it is. Goals have a rarity value that points and runs and sets do not, and so there will always be that thrill, the thrill of seeing someone do something that can only be done three or four times in a whole game if you are lucky, not at all if you are not. And I love the pace of it, its lack of formula; and I love the way that small men can destroy big men ... in a way that they can't in other contact sports, and the way that t he best team does not necessarily win. And there's the athleticism ... , and the way that strength and intelligence have to combine. It allows players to look beautiful and balletic in a way that some sports do not: a perfectly-timed diving header, or a perfectly-struck volley, allow the body to achieve a poise and grace that some sportsmen can never exhibit. — Nick Hornby

Partisans present some of the most refreshing music I've heard in a long while, uncompromising, very well written and very well played. It demands serious attention. I hear in these players a sense of common purpose and resolve, and a strong command of a dialect uniquely suited to this music. It's heartening to hear music that looks to find its own particular place. — Steve Swallow

Major league baseball has asked its players to stop tossing baseballs into the stands during games, because they say fans fight over them and they get hurt. In fact, the Florida Marlins said that's why they never hit any home runs. It's a safety issue. — Jay Leno

Numerous things that go on such as the way Houston interacts with my family; we're treated in a first-class way. They helped us when my wife lost our baby daughter in a miscarriage. They help with anything you ask of them because they are a very caring organization with positive attitudes about its players. — Johnathan Joseph

I thought about the guy in the truck, the focus in his expression, and I felt like I already knew enough of the story to tell it to somebody else maybe better than either of its major players could. — John Darnielle

The Greeks, or more correctly the Athenians, invented the idea of theatre, as they invented so many other social and cultural institutions which the west then came to take for granted. There is nothing self-evident about the idea of theatre, of plays and players through whom private individuals, lacking priestly or other authority, publicly examined man's fate and commented on it by a poetic play which, despite the many traditional elements, was in its essential qualities a creation of the playwright. — Moses I. Finley

Sometimes players need to gain time on the clock by repeating the position, but most often its purpose is to wear down the opponent psychologically. — Pal Benko

The University of Houston has made an excellent choice by hiring Ron Hughey as its new women's basketball coach. Coach Hughey will bring an expertise and energy level to the program that will excite fans and put Houston Women's Basketball back on the map. Having watched him coach up close, I know his players will improve immensely and love learning from him. I look forward to following Houston Basketball in the years to come. — Mike Thibault

The greatest players fit with the team. They play within the team's style, rather than asking the team to change its style. — Patrick Ewing

Whenever I see those crmison jerseys and crimson helmets, I feel humbled to have played football for Alabama. Other players in the NFL talk to me about their schools and their traditions. I just smile knowing the immense love Alabama fans have for our school and its football program. I'm proud to be a part of that Crimson Tide heritage. — Derrick Thomas

It took time for the church to come to terms with the ignominy of the cross. Church fathers forbade its depiction in art until the reign of the Roman emperor Constantine ... Now, though, the symbol is everywhere: artists beat gold into the shape of the Roman execution device, baseball players cross themselves before batting, and cancy confectioners even make chocolate crosses for the faithful to eat during Holy Week. Strange as it may seem, Christianity has become a religion of the cross
the gallows, the electric chair, the gas chamber, in modern terms. — Philip Yancey

Michael Lewis, the author of Moneyball, wrote in the New York Times in February 2009, The virus that infected professional baseball in the 1990s, the use of statistics to find new and better ways to value players and strategies, has found its way into every major sport. Not just basketball and football, but also soccer and cricket and rugby and, for all I know, snooker and darts - — Anonymous

Cultural messages inform the populace that if they aren't perpetually electric they are missing out on the pinnacle of relatedness. Every pop-cultural medium portrays the height of adult intimacy as the moment when two attractive people who don't know a thing about each other tumble into bed and have passionate sex. All the waking moments of our love lives should tend, we are told, toward that throbbing, amorous apotheosis. But "in love" merely brings the players together, and the end of that prelude is as inevitable as it is desirable. True relatedness has a chance to blossom only with the waning of its intoxicating predecessor. (207) — Thomas Lewis

the mystery of love bespeaks another mystery - the mystery of God. If we refuse to ascribe the name of God to the mystery of love, we shall remain in the throes of endless self-deception. Which means that melancholia cannot but be deeply, inherently religious. It has its human players and counterplayers, yet, in the end, it always comes down to one's personal experience of the mystery, the uncanniness of love. And there is nothing more uncanny than a love that has no knowable boundaries. — Donald Capps

The relationship between France and its 'foreign' players - blacks and North African Arabs - has always been troubled, particularly with Algerians. — Rabih Alameddine

Baseball is known for superstitious players and cursed teams - and at the root of every curse there's a story. Boston's curse was to trade Babe Ruth to the Yankees. Cubs fans claim a billy goat is responsible for their futility. And Cleveland's curse? The club struggled after its Pennant-winning 1954 season, but it was rich with optimism just two years later as an onslaught of new talent promised to lift the club once more to the ranks of baseball's elite - and by 1959 the club was contending for the Pennant again. And then GM Frank Lane traded Rocky Colavito to the Detroit Tigers and cursed everything. — Tucker Elliot

Sport strips away personality, letting the white bone of character shine through. Sport gives players an opportunity to know and test themselves. The great difference between sport and art is that sport, like a sonnet, forces beauty within its own system. Art, on the other hand, cyclically destroys boundaries and breaks free. — Rita Mae Brown

Few footprints of the great remain in the sand before the ever-flowing tide. Long ago it washed out Homer's. Curiosity follows him in vain; Greece and Asia perplex us with a rival Stratford-upon-Avon. The rank of Aristophanes is only conjectured from his gift to two poor players in Athens. The age made no sign when Shakespeare, its noblest son, passed away. — Robert Aris Willmott

Inexperienced players have a fear of this piece, which seems to them enigmatic, mysterious, and astonishing in its power. We must admit that it has remarkable characteristics which compel respect and occasionally surprise the most wary players. — Eugene Znosko-Borovsky

It is a mass language only in the same sense that its baseball slang is born of baseball players. That is, it is a language which is being molded by writers to do delicate things and yet be within the grasp of superficially educated people. It is not a natural growth, much as its proletarian writers would like to think so. But compared with it at its best, English has reached the Alexandrian stage of formalism and decay. — Raymond Chandler

I believe every era has its significance and the same holds true for players and coaches. — Sachin Tendulkar

Seth always had to force Georgie to go to parties. Once she was there, she was fine. Once she was there, she was usually great
if not the life of the party, certainly one of its most valuable players. People (new people, strangers) made Georgie nervous. And nervous Georgie was much more extroverted than regular Georgie. Nervous Georgie was practically manic. — Rainbow Rowell

What's so amazing in today's society is people look up to football players. And as a football player, you have a platform. And it's so much more important than any touchdown or trophy or anything you could win with football. Its taking that platform and be able to influence people. — Tim Tebow

But the most obvious fact about praise
whether of God or anything
strangely escaped me. I thought of it in terms of compliment, approval, or the giving of honor. I had never noticed that all enjoyment spontaneously overflows into praise ... The world rings with praise
lovers praising their mistresses, readers their favorite poet, walkers praising the countryside, players praising their favorite game ... I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation. — C.S. Lewis

When I looked into the story of Soviet hockey and its players, I realized that it has nothing to do with hockey. It was a larger story using hockey as a window into the story of the rise and fall of the Soviet Union, the Russian people, with friendships and betrayals, paranoia and oppression, and the meaning of sports to people and nations around the world, and how sports was used as a political tool. — Gabe Polsky

Football spectators appreciate a bit of loyalty, and we're seeing that less and less. There are echelons of football, as in society, where some players are clearly mercenaries. I regret in a way that somehow the local identification, the local bonding between the community and its football team has been commercialised to such an extent. — Vincent Nichols

The NBA and NHL have different agendas: The NBA is much more protective of its players and its brand; the NHL has less to lose, and it's in their best interest to generate buzz any way they can. — Bill Simmons