Playoff Quotes & Sayings

In many college classes, laptops depict split screens - notes from a class, and then a range of parallel stimulants: NBA playoff statistics on ESPN, a flight home on Expedia, a new flirtation on Facebook. — Samantha Power

Everything we talk about is about beating the Packers, the Bears and the Vikings. Obviously there are other teams in the league, but if you can dominate and be on top of your division you are always in the playoff hunt. It's time for us to win that thing. — Steve Mariucci

Of all the people in the world who could've won the seat next to mine at that playoff game ... it was you, Gemma. You. The one person on the planet who might just understand me. — Julie Johnson

Playoff hockey is the best way to market your team. It's the best way to grow your fan base and give hope to your players and for them to develop. — Steve Yzerman

I'm in a win-win playoff. Response of a Christian dying of cancer at thirty on the prospect of miraculous healing. — Billy Graham

When it comes to signing up new talent, that's what I'm looking for
not just someone who has the skill, but someone built for this life. Someone who has the work ethic, the drive. The gift that Jordan had wasn't just that he was willing to do the work, but he loved doing it, because he could feel himself getting stronger, ready for anything. He left the game and came back and worked just as hard as he did when he started. He came into the game as Rookie of the Year, and he finished the last playoff game of his career with a shot that won the Bulls their sixth championship. THAT'S THE KIND OF CONSISTENCY THAT YOU CAN ONLY GET BY ADDING DEAD-SERIOUS DISCIPLINE TO WHATEVER TALENT YOU HAVE. — Jay-Z

Sports exact too harsh a toll on our beautiful women. Like engendered species, they should be protected, and instead, we exploit them and demand they fly too close to the sun for our amusement. We send them into the arena for an exhausting three-setter, an 18-hole playoff, a 200th lap. The burnout factor is insurmountable. — Kevin Bleyer

By the age of 18, the average American has witnessed 200,000 acts of violence on television, most of them occurring during Game 1 of an NHL playoff series. — Steve Rushin

I'd rather have a 16, as in Stanley Cup playoff wins. — Lindy Ruff

We had an opportunity to clinch a playoff berth and I think if that's not enough motivation I don't think you should be playing this game. — Tina Thompson

We literally had all 10 teams alive for a playoff position in the final week of the season. That outstanding balance and those close races created a major surge in attendance in the last month of the season. — Lamar Hunt

Andrew Luck, if he gets to his first Super Bowl and he wins that Super Bowl, that means he won on the road every game except for that first playoff game. He went and beat Peyton Manning ... Then that means he went and beat Tom Brady ... Then he would either have to beat Aaron Rodgers or the Seattle Seahawks. That's a pretty tough hill to climb. If he does that, he's just solidified himself in that conversation as an elite quarterback. — Charles Woodson

I'm a football guy. Baseball, I enjoy it at playoff time. — Jon Bon Jovi

I live for the Red Sox. I thoroughly enjoy them. For whatever reason, baseball has been a lot more fun for me in recent years. I loosely follow the Patriots and I root for them. I loosely follow the Celtics and then it gets to playoff time and I don't miss a game. Same with the Bruins. I'm not the diehard fan anymore. — Doug Flutie

You'll never have a 16-team playoff in college football. The most that could happen would be four teams in the next century. But after that, I'm dead, so who cares? — Beano Cook

At the same time, preparation is important to playoff success. — Barry Trotz

That's what you work all season for, to get into the playoff games, and you don't want to blow it. — Ray Nitschke

So you wake up this morning and find you're president of the United States. Pretty cool, no? Helicopters and a 747 at your disposal; courtside seats at any NBA playoff game of your choice; everyone stands up and the band plays when you come into the room. — Jeff Greenfield

When it comes to playoff time, I pull the energy and the motivation. — Pau Gasol

I care about this state ... and I feel a responsibility to get things done. If we stay healthy and play smart we can be a playoff team. I think we're on the right track. — Steve Mariucci

We're just a fragile team right now. It seems like when we have a little bit of adversity, when something goes wrong, you can feel it on the bench, it kind of sinks. Unless we get a goal or something really positive happens, it's tough. I think falling out of the playoff race takes the wind out of your sails for sure. — Wes Walz

I'm not going to fight because I mean too much to our team, and I can't afford to be suspended for a game or do something stupid to get me kicked out of a playoff game. — LeBron James

This is definitely a playoff team. There's no question about that. It's just a matter of how much we want it. — Peter Bondra

Playoff basketball ... you've got to treat every possession like it's your last. — Paul Pierce

You've got to enjoy time with your family and friends, and if you're involved in sports franchises, those peak moments in playoff games. You have to enjoy life. — Paul Allen

Any time you're playing a playoff-caliber team, it is always good to show well, because you don't know when you'll be seeing them again. — John Lackey

Derek Lowe and Curt Schilling were veterans when Boston won the 2004 World Series, but they were quick to recognize Johnny Pesky by name - and for good reason. Pesky last played for Boston in 1952, but his close ties to the organization since his career ended in 1954 are legendary. His presence was so great, among rookies and veterans alike, that Lowe and Schilling understood that the championship belonged to Pesky just as much as it did to the guys on the playoff roster. — Tucker Elliot

The more playoff games and Super Bowls and things of that nature that you're in obviously is going to build your portfolio and raise your visibility. — Larry Fitzgerald

I played in Joe Louis in a playoff game. I played there when the roof caved in for half a season. The facility is great for basketball because it goes straight up, so you feel like the fans are on top of you. — Bill Laimbeer

Hed been to the playoffs before. I was asked last week what I thought this season has felt like for Coach Gibbs. I would think it must seem very familiar to a man with all those playoff wins. Hes a great coach who understands how to get his team to play. — Mark Brunell

As an organization, would we like to be in a better spot Everybody would like to know they're in the playoffs. But that's not a reality, year after year being in a playoff spot with 10, 12, 15 games left. We don't have that this year, so our playoffs have started. — John Tortorella

When I look back at the tapes, your first everything, your first All-Star Game, your first playoff experience, it just seems like it went by really fast. — Roger Clemens

When you inherit a franchise that won one playoff game in the last 10 years, you've inherited a troubled franchise. — Jeffrey Lurie

It's not a playoff game, it's like the Super Bowl. ... This is going to be a blood bath out there. I know they're going to be ready to play. This is going to be a physical game. I'm sure that I'm going to be ready and I know my boys are going to be ready to back it up. — Jason Pierre-Paul

People really don't care, in some ways, that you have a family. With a high profile job like I have, they just want you to win basketball games. You can do that and still keep your family together. I try the best I can to be at the basketball practices or tennis practices or recitals. In my first year at Dallas my (then 11-year old) son Avery Jr., said, "You know daddy, you're still the best coach in the NBA." I was like, "But I haven't won a playoff game yet." And he said, "That's okay. You're still my daddy." That makes you feel good. — Avery Johnson

I never paid, or intended to pay, $10,000, or any amount of money, to any player for knocking Kurt Warner, Brett Favre or any other player out of the 2009 Divisional playoff game, 2010 NFC Championship Game or any other game. — Jonathan Vilma

The most important thing is playoff sex ... er ... um ... I mean success — Marc Crawford

When the day inevitably comes that a Pac-12 team beats out an SEC team for the last playoff spot, you can be sure of two things: 1) Callers to The Paul Finebaum Show the next day will utter things never before heard on radio and 2) the SEC will go to nine conference games, stat. — Stewart Mandel

What I meant by that is, any time you have adversity, now you've got a chance to see all of these guys play every game the rest of the way like it's a playoff game. What you want guys to do when there's adversity is to play harder and play better, and that's when you see what kind of guys you have in your locker room. — Mike Shanahan

Former Journey lead singer Steve Perry was a lifelong Giants fan who grew up in the San Joaquin Valley. When the Dodgers started showing him on the big screen during their nightly sing-along, Perry protested by sneaking out of his seats before the eighth inning began. Now the Giants were making their playoff run, and Perry had become a regular sight at AT&T park, thrashing around from a club-level suite as he spurred on the crowd. — Andrew Baggarly

There were a lot of big games. But I think one of the biggest was one that will go down as one of the biggest upsets in playoff history. We were 15-point underdogs going into Miami and upset them. That was a big one. — Chuck Knox

I love our fans. Our fans are so supportive. It's been incredible to end four playoff games with 'Go Pack Go.' It's great at home, they travel well, it's on a first-name basis. It's a special play to play and all of us are blessed to play in Green Bay, and hopefully we will be repaying those fans with the Lombardi trophy. — Aaron Rodgers

I had to do something special coming in. I didn't do it, so I had to do it in the playoff. Winning the Mercedes is awesome. Winning three times is a dream come true. — Stuart Appleby

Americans have become conditioned to believe the world is a gray place without absolutes; this is because we're simultaneously cowardly and arrogant. We don't know the answers, so we assume they must not exist. But they do exist. They are unclear and/or unfathomable, but they're out there. And - perhaps surprisingly - the only way to find those answers is to study NBA playoff games that happened twenty years ago. For all practical purposes, the voice of Brent Musburger was the pen of Ayn Rand. — Chuck Klosterman

Because I always try so hard to win and had my troubles in Boston, I was suspended. At playoff time, it hurts not to be in the game with the boys. However, I want to do what is good for the people of Montreal and the team. So that no further harm will be done, I would like to ask everyone to get behind the team and to help the boys win from the Rangers and Detroit. I will take my punishment and come back next year to help the club and younger players to win the cup. — Maurice Richard

Vijay Singh won a playoff in 2004 at Whistling Straits after a final-round 76, which was the highest last round by the winner of any major since 1938, when Reg Whitcombe won the British Open with a 78 in a storm that blew down the exhibition tent at Sandwich. — Dan Jenkins

It's just like high school. If you're a freshman or a sophomore, it's hard to tell the seniors who've been through two, three, playoff games what to do. — Tony Romo

I think we have played like a playoff team for some time. We can still do better. The key thing right now is to look forward, not behind you. — Teemu Selanne

I don't remember those early playoff games. Keep it positive. I'm a different player. More focused. I know how important it is to score in the playoffs. — Pavel Datsyuk

In rich detail, Ken told us that on the second hole of the opening round, Hogan got stuck while standing over a putt. Hogan had the yips. "I can't take it back, Ken," Hogan said. "Nobody gives a shit, Ben," Ken said back. That bit of wise-guy humor was evidently all Hogan needed to hear: At age fifty-three and playing barely any tournament golf, he finished twelfth. Venturi finished three shots behind. Palmer was leading by seven with nine holes left and lost to Billy Casper in a playoff. Ken — Michael Bamberger